
| _ VAN NQSTftANP SCIE NCE SERIES. 

I JVo. 18 . Price SO Cents, 

TD SEWERAGE 

t 4 b AND 

1^22. SEWAGE 
PURIFICATION 


By M. N. BAKER, Ph. B., C. E. 

Associate Editob, “Engineering News.” 

Joint Author “ Sewage Disposal in the United States.” 
Author “Sewage Purification in America,” 
“British Sewage Works.” 


Second Edition, Revised and Enlarged, 


NEW YORK: 

D. VAN NOSTRAND COMPANY, 

23 Murray and 27 Warren Streets. 


1905. 

























THE 

An 


No. 

No.! 

iNo. 



IBS. 


BOIL- 
an ed. 
)endix 
I, M.E. 

3burn, 

in. 

ALLS, 


No. 

Vo. 

No. 

No. 

No. 


Class_ 

Book_ 

CopyrightN 0 _ 

COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 


'J 

i By 
endix. 


Sutler. 

James 


N OF 
cb, A. 
by E. 


FRE- 

C. 

3. By 

?ed by 


No. 0.— A TREATISE ON FUEL. By Arthur V. Abbott, 
C.E. Founded on the original treatise of C. Will* 
iam Siemens, D.C.L. 


No. 10. —COMPOUND ENGINES. Translated from the 
French of A. Mallet. Second edition, revised, 
with results of American Practice by Richard H. 
Buel, C.E. 

No. 11.— THEORY OF ARCHES. By Prof. W. Allan. 

No. 12.—THEORY OF VOUSSOIR ARCHES. By Prof. W. 

- Cain. Second edition, revised and enlarged. 

No. 18.— GASES MET WITH IN COAL-MINES. By J. J. 

Atkinson. Third edition, revised and enlarged 
by Edward H. Williams, jun. 

NO. M»— FRICTION OF AIR IN MINES. By J. J. Atkinson. 
Second American edition. 


No. 1R—SKEW ARCHES. By Prof. E. W. Hyde, C.E. Illustr. 


No. 16.—A GRAPHIC METHOD FOR SOLVING CERTAIN 
QUESTIONS IN ARITHMETIC OR ALGEBRA. 
By Prof. G. L. Vose. 

£ku N.—WATER AND WATER-SUPPLY. By Prof. W. H. 

Corfield of the University College, London. 
Second American edition. 


NO. 18.— SEWERAGE AND SEWAGE PURIFICATION. By 
M. N. Baker, Associate Editor “ Engineering News.” 














THE VAN NOSTRAND SCIENCE SEMES 


No. 19.—STRENGTH OF BEAMS UNDER TRANSVERSE 
LOADS. By Prof. W. Allan, author of “Theory 
of Arches.” Second edition, revised. 

No. 20.—BRIDGE AND TUNNEL CENTRES. By John B. 

McMaster, C.E. Second edition. 

No. 21.—SAFETY VALVES. Second Edition. By Richard 
H. Buel, C.E. 

No. 22.— HIGH MASONRY DAMS. By E. Sherman Gould, 
M. Am. Soc. C. E. 

No. 23.—THE FATIGUE OF METALS UNDER REPEATED 
STRAINS. With various Tables of Results and 
Experiments. From the German of Prof. Ludwig 
Spangenburgh, with a .Preface by S. H. Shreve, 
A.M. 

No. 24.—A PRACTICAL TREATISE ON THE TEETH OF 
WHEELS. By Prof. S. W. Robinson. Second 
edition, revised. 

No. 25.—ON THE THEORY AND CALCULATION OF CON¬ 
TINUOUS BRIDGES. By R. M. Wilcox, Pli. D. 

Lo. 26.—PRACTICAL TREATISE ON THE PROPERTIES 
OF CONTINUOUS BRIDGES. By Charles 
Bender, C.E. 

No. 27.—ON BOILER INCRUSTATION AND CORROSION. 

By F. J. Rowan. New Ed. Rev. by F. E. Idell. 

No. 28.—TRANSMISSION OF POWER BY WIRE ROPES. 
Second edition. By Albert W. Stahl, U.S.N. 

No. 29.—STEAM INJECTORS. Translated from the French 
of M. Leon Pochet. 

No. 30.—TERRESTRIAL MAGNETISM AND THE MAG¬ 
NETISM OF IRON VESSELS. By Prof, Fair- 
man Rogers. 

No. 31.—THE SANITARY CONDITION OF DWELLING- 
HOUSES IN TOWN AND COUNTRY. By 
George E. Waring, jun. 

No. 32.—CABLE-MAKING FOR SUSPENSION BRIDGES. 
By W. Hildebrand, C.E. 

No. 33.—MECHANICS OF VENTILATION. By George W. 

Rafter, C.E. New and Revised Edition. 

No. 34.-FOUNDATIONS. By Prof. Jules Gaudard, C.E. 
Second edition. Translated from the French. 

No. 35.—THE ANEROID BAROMETER: ITS CONSTRUO 
TION AND USE. Compiled by George W 
Plympton. Eighth edition. 

No. 36.—MATTER AND MOTION. By J. Clerk Maxwell, 
M.A. Second American edition. 

No. 37.—GEOGRAPHICAL SURVEYING ; ITS USES, 
METHODS, AND RESULTS. By Frank De 
Yeaux Carpenter, C.E. 

No. 38.—MAXIMUM STRESSES IN FRAMED BRIDGES. 
By Prof. William Cain, A.M., C.E. 

New and revised edition. 











THE 


BS, 


ioniu, ovarul!. me® ou t'eatl Each. 

Amply Illustrated when the Subject Demands . 


No. 4 .—CHIMNEYS FOR FURNACES AND STEAM-BOIL¬ 
ERS. By R. Armstrong, C.E. 3d American ed. 
Revised and partly rewritten, with an Appendix 
on Theory of Chimney Draught, by F. E. Idell, M.E. 

No. 2.—STEAM-BOILER EXPLOSIONS. By Zerah Colburn. 
New edition, revised by Prof. R. H. Thurston. 

ftlo. 3.—PRACTICAL DESIGNING OF RETAINING-WALLS, 
Fourth edition. By Prof. W. Cain. 

No. 4.—PROPORTIONS OF PINS USED IN BRIDGES^ By 
Chas. E. Bender, C.E. 2d edition, with appendix. 

No. VENTILATION OF BUILDINGS. By W. F. Butler. 

Second coition, re-edited and enlarged by James 
L. Greenleaf, C. E. 

No. 6.— ON THE DESIGNING AND CONSTRUCTION OF 
STORAGE RESERVOIRS. By Arthur Jacob, A. 

B. Second edition, revised, with additions by E. 
Sherman Gould. 

No. 7.—SURCHARGED AND DIFFERENT FORMS OB’ RE¬ 
TAINING-WALLS. By James S. Tate, C.E. 

No. 8.—A TREATISE ON THE COMPOUND ENGINE By 
John Turnbull, jun. Second edition, revised by 
Prof. S. W. Robinson. 

No. 0.— A TREATISE ON FUEL. By Arthur V. Abbott, 

C. E. Founded on the original treatise of C. Will¬ 
iam Siemens, D.C.L. 

No. 10.-— COMPOUND ENGINES. Translated from the 
French of A. Mallet. Second edition, revised, 
with results of American Practice by Richard H. 

NO. 11.— THEORY OF ARCHES. By Prof. W. Allan. 

No. J2.—THEORY OF VOUSSOIR ARCHES. By Prof. W. 

? Cain. Second edition, revised and enlarged. 

No. 18.— OASES MET WITH IN COAL-MINES. By J. J. 

Atkinson. Third edition, revised and enlarged 
by Edward H. Williams, jun. S 

Ma tA— FRICTION OF AIR IN MINES. By J. J. Atkinson. 
Second American edition. 

No. Ufc— <SKEW ARCHES. By Prof. E. W. Hyde, C.E. Illustr. 
No. 16.—A GRAPHIC METHOD FOR SOLVING CERTAIN 
QUESTIONS IN ARITHMETIC OR ALGEBRA. 
By Prof. G. L. Vose. 

Sfe. M.—WATER AND WATER-SUPPLY. By Prof. W. H. 

Corfield of the University College, London. 
Second American edition. 

No. 18.—SEWERAGE AND SEWAGE PURIFICATION. By 
, M. N. Baker, Associate Editor “ Engineering News.” 











THE VAN NO STRAND SCIENCE SERIES 


No. 19.— STRENGTH OF BEAMS UNDER TRANSVERSE 
LOADS. By Prof. W. Allan, author of “Theory 
of Arches.” Second edition, revised. 

No. SO.—BRIDGE AND TUNNEL CENTRES. By John B. 
McMaster, C.E. Second edition. 

No. 21. —SAFETY VALVES. Second Edition. By Richard 
H. Buel, C.E. 

No. 22 .—HIGH MASONRY DAMS. By E. Sherman Gould, 
M. Ain. Soc. C. E. 

No. S3.—THE FATIGUE OF METALS UNDER REPEATED 
STRAINS. With various Tables of Results and 
Experiments. From the German of Prof. Ludwig 
Spangenburgh, with a Preface by S. H. Shreve, 
AM. 

No. S4.—A PRACTICAL TREATISE ON THE TEETH OF 
WHEELS. By Prof. S. W. Robinson. Second 
edition, revised. 

No. 25.—ON THE THEORY AND CALCULATION OF CON¬ 
TINUOUS BRIDGES. By R. M. Wilcox, Pli. D. 

Lo. 26.—PRACTICAL TREATISE ON THE PROPERTIES 
OF CONTINUOUS BRIDGES. By Charles 
Bender, C.E. 

No. 27.—ON BOILER INCRUSTATION AND CORROSION. 

By F. J. Rowan. New Ed. Rev. by F. E. Idell. 

No. 28.—TRANSMISSION OF POWER BY WIRE ROPES. 
Second edition. By Albert W. Stahl, U.S.N. 

No. 29.—STEAM INJECTORS. Translated from the French 
of M. Leon Pochet. 

No. 80.—TERRESTRIAL MAGNETISM AND THE MAG¬ 
NETISM OF IRON VESSELS. By Prof, Fair- 
man Rogers. 

No. 31.—THE SANITARY CONDITION OF DWELLING- 
HOUSES IN TOWN AND COUNTRY. By 
George E. Waring, jam 

No. 32.—CABLE-MAKING FOR SUSPENSION BRIDGES. 
By W. Hildebrand, C.E. 

No. 33.— MECHANICS OF VENTILATION. By George W. 

Rafter, C.E. New and Revised Edition. 

No. 34.-FOUNDATIONS. By Prof. Jules Gaudard, C.E. 
Second edition. Translated from the French. 

No. 35.—THE ANEROID BAROMETER: ITS CONSTRUO 
TION AND USE. Compiled by George W 
Plympton. Eighth edition. 

No. 36.— MATTER AND MOTION. By J. Clerk Maxwell, 

M.A. Second American edition. 

No. 37.—GEOGRAPHICAL SURVEYING ; ITS USES, 
METHODS, AND RESULTS. By Frank De 
Yeaux Carpenter, C.E. 

No. 38.—MAXIMUM STRESSES IN FRAMED BRIDGES. 
By Prof. William Cain, A.M., C.E. 

New and revised edition. 











No 8®.— A HANDBOOK OF THE ELECTRO-MAGNETIC 
TELEGRAPH. By A. E. Loring. 

No 40 —TRANSMISSION OF POWER BY COMPRESSED 
AIR. By Robert Zahner, M.E. Second edition. 

No. 41 .— STRENGTH OF MATERIALS. By William Kent, 

C. E. f Assoc. Editor, Engineering News. Second Ed. 

No 42 —THEORY OF STEEL-CONCRETE ARCHES, AND OF 
VAULTED STRUCTURES. By Prof. William Cam. 

No. 48.— WAVE AND VORTEX MOTION. By Dr. Thomas 
Craig, of Johns Hopkins University. 

No 44 .— TURBINE WHEELS. By Prof. W. P. Trowbridge, 
Columbia College. Second edition. Revised. 

No. 46 .—THERMODYNAMICS. By Prof. H. T. Eddy, Uni- 
versity of Cincinnati. 

No. 46.— ICE-MAKING MACHINES. From the French of 
M. Le Doux. Revised by Prof. Denton. 

No 47.—LINKAGES ; THE DIFFERENT FORMS AND 
USES OF ARTICULATED LINKS. By J. D. O. 
de Roos. 

No. 48 .— THEORY OF SOLID AND BRACED ARCHES 
By William Cain, C.E. 

No. 49.—ON THE MOTION OF A SOLID IN A FLUID. 
By Thomas Craig, Ph.D. 

No. 50 .—DWELLING-HOUSES: THEIR SANITARY CON¬ 
STRUCTION AND ARRANGEMENTS. By Prof. 
W. H. Corfield. 

No. 51 .—THE TELESCOPE: ITS CONSTRUCTION, ETC. 
By Thomas Nolan. 

No. 53.—IMAGINARY QUANTITIES. Translated from the 
French of M. Argand. By Prof. Hardy. 

No. 53 .—INDUCTION COILS: HOW MADE AND HOW 
USED. Fifth edition. 

No. 54.—KINEMATICS OF MACHINERY. By Prof. Ken¬ 
nedy. With an introduction by Prof. R. H. 
Thurston. 

No. 55.—SEWER GASES : THEIR NATURE AND ORIGIN. 

By A. de Varona. 2d ed., revised and enlarged. 
No. 56.—THE ACTUAL LATERAL PRESSURE OF EARTH¬ 
WORK. By Benjamin Baker, M. Inst. C.E. 

*•' 57.—INCANDESCENT ELECTRIC LIGHTING. A 
Practical Description of the Edison System. By 
L. H. Latimer, to which is added the Design and 
Operation of Incandescent Stations. By C. J. 
Field, and the Maximum Efficiency of Incandes¬ 
cent Lamps, by John W. Howell. 

Ho. 89.— THE VENTILATION OF COAL-MINES. By W. 
Fairley, M.E., F.S.S., and Geo. J. AndrA 

Ho. 38 .— RAILROAD ECONOMICS; OR, NOTES, WITH 
COMMENTS. By S. W. Robinson. C.E. 





















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SEWAGE DISPOSAL 

IN THE 

UNITED STATES. 

BY 

GEO. W. RAFTER, M. Am. Soe. C. E., 

AND 

M. N. BAKER, Ph.B., 

Associate Editor “Engineering News.” 

Large 8 vo, 600 pages , 7 plates , 116 illustrations 
in the text. 


Part I. of this great work discusses the principles of 
the subject in detail, citing foreign experience where 
it will throw light upon the subject, but dealing chiefly 
with American ideas and practice, and with the broad 
principles of sewage purification, or other means of 
disposal, which are more or less applicable every¬ 
where. Each method of purification is discussed at 
length, and many allied subjects never before treated 
in a comprehensive manner are taken up. 

Part II. is an exhaustive description of about forty 
sewage purification plants as actually built in the 
United States and Canada, with many details of cost, 
methods of operation and the results obtained in actual 
practice. Several appendices give English and Amer¬ 
ican Statute Laws regarding stream pollution and its 
prevention, and the duties and powers lodged in State 
Boards of Health for the preservation of the purity of 
inland waters, especially where used for public water 
supplies. 

Sent Postpaid on Receipt op $6.00 by the Pub- 
lishees, 

D. VAN NOSTRAND CO., 

23 Murray and 27 Warren Streets, New York City. 




SEWERAGE 

AND 

SEWAGE 

PURIFICATION 


By M. N. BAKER, Ph. B., C. E. 

Associate Editor, “ Engineering News.” 

Joint Author “ Sewage Disposal in the United States.” 
Author “Sewage Purification in America,” 
“British Sewage Works.” 


Second Edition, Revised and Enlarged. 




NEW YORK: 

D. VAN NOSTRAND COMPANY, 

23 Murray and 27 Warren Streets. 


1905 . 











~r 


,vsn 


f LIBRARY of CONGRESS 
Two Cooies deemed 

jun 21 im 

(j Goayngnt entry 

/S/?oS~ 

/cuss 'CL AXc. Not 

/2/7/1. 

copy b. 




"Ofe4s 
1 ZE z 2 _ 


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CoPYKIGHT, 1905, 

By D. VAN NOSTRAND COMPANY. 
All Rights Reserved. 











PREFACE. 

One of the earliest volumes in this series 
was “Sewerage and Sewage Utilization,” by 
Professor W. H. Corfield, of the Univer¬ 
sity of London. Appearing in 1875, when 
only a few score American cities had sew¬ 
erage systems worthy the name, and when 
sewage purification was practically un¬ 
known in this country, the little book was 
and for many years continued to be of great 
service this side the water. 

When, after twenty years, the publishers 
requested the author to revise the book, he 
found revision, or even re-writirg, entirely 
out of the question, so ill-suited were its 
matter and method to modern American 
conditions. 

There being a strong demand for a brief 
but comprehensive book on the subject, it 
was decided that an entirely new one 
should be written. 

Professor Corfield entitled his discussion 


IV 


“ Sewerage and Sewage Utilization.” The 
present author prefers to use “ Purifica¬ 
tion,” rather than “Utilization,” in his 
title. In making this change he does not 
wish to detract from the importance or 
possibilities of utilization, but simply to 
put purification, or the sanitary problem, 
first, and utilization, or the commercial 
problem, second. In addition, utilization 
is only one of several processes of purifi¬ 
cation. 

There are now in the United States some 
fifty cities and villages, many institutions, 
manufactories and houses, employing one 
or another system of sewage purification. 
The studies of the Massachusetts State 
Board of Health have given an impetus to 
intermittent filtration of late, but chemical 
precipitation is practiced in many places 
and broad irrigation is quite common, es¬ 
pecially in the West, where “Water is 
King,” and the sewage is used for plant 
drink rather than plant food. 

It is hoped that this little book will be 
of use to some engineers, especially those 
whose practice has been in other lines of 


V. 


engineering, and to that vast and rapidly 
growing body of sewer commissioners and 
superintendents, boards of public works, 
boards of health, mayors and city council- 
men, and public spirited citizen in general, 
all of whom are of late taking a growing 
and most promising interest in sanitary 
problems. 

M. N. B. 

104 Tribune Building, 

New York, Dec. 31, 1895. 


PREFACE TO THE SECOND 
EDITION. 

In the nearly ten years that have elapsed 
since the appearance of the first edition of 
this little book, the newer and so-called 
bacterial processes of sewage treatment 
have been announced, passed through an 
experimental stage and come into extensive 
use. Meanwhile the author has improved 
many opportunities to visit American sew- 



VI. 


age purification works, old and new, and 
during 1904 spent several months abroad, 
chiefly in Great Britain, visiting sewage 
works and meeting a number of the men 
prominently connected with British pro¬ 
gress in this field. As a consequence of 
the events named above, the section of this 
book which deals with the purification of 
sewage has been largely rewritten and 
somewhat extended. Few changes in the 
other section, on sewerage systems as con¬ 
trasted with disposal works, have been 
deemed necessary. 

220 Broadway, v 

New York, May 5, 1905. 


M. N. B. 


CONTENTS. 


Page. 

Why a Sewerage System is Needed. 5 

The Value of a Sewerage System. 12 

Good Engineering Advice Essential. 14 

Preliminary Reports and Plans. 15 

Separate or Combined System. 21 

Subsoil Drainage. 25 

Final Disposal of Sewage. 28 

Population, Water Consumption, Volume of 

Sewage, Rainfall. 34 

Method of Meeting the Cost. 46 

Design and Construction of the Conduit 

System.. 58 

Manholes. 63 

Sewer Grades. 64 

Flushing Devices. 64 

Y-Branches for House Connections. 66 

Ventilation of Sewers. 68 

Misapprehensions Regarding So-called Sewer 

Gas. 72 

Dr. Billings* Opinion on Sewer Air and Ven¬ 
tilation. 74 

Features Peculiar to the Combined System.. 77 

Catch Basins or Rainwater Inlets. 80 

Storm Overflows. 81 






















m 


Page. 

Pumping Stations, Receiving Reservoirs and 

Force Mains. 82 

Tidal Chambers. 84 

Final Plans and Specifications. 84 

Securing Bids and Awarding Contracts. 86 

The Proper Execution of the Contract. 90 

Operating the System. 92 

Sewarge Commission, Board of Public Works 

or City Council. 93 


Sewage Purification in its General Aspects.... 95 

Sedimentation. 104 

Mechanical Straining. 106 

Chemical Precipitation. 108 

The Septic Tank. 110 

Artificial Aeration.— 4 4 Electrical ” Processes. 121 

Broad Irrigation or Sewage Farming. 125 

Sub-Surface Irrigation. 131 

Intermittent Filtration. 131 

Contact Beds. 112 

Percolating Filters...... 147 

Sewage Purification Plants not Nuisances. 149 

The Present Status of Sewage Purification.... 150 




















SEWERAGE AND SEWAGE PURI¬ 
FICATION. 


Why a Sewerage System is Needed. 


An abundant supply of pure water is 
one of the greatest advantages which any 
community can possess. This is so gener¬ 
ally recognized that every American town 
with a population reaching into the thous¬ 
ands has, or is planning to obtain, a public 
water supply. Such a supply having been 
secured, distributed through the streets 
and houses, used and enjoyed, what dispo¬ 
sition shall be made of it ? Obviously its 
removal may be the very reverse of its in¬ 
troduction. As it was distributed through 
a network of conduits diminishing in size 
with their ramifications, so it may be col¬ 
lected again by similar conduits, increas¬ 
ing in size, as one after another they unite 
in a common outlet. But the outgoing 
volume is far different from the incoming. 
The influent was pure and limpid ; the 




6 


effluent has been fouled in performing the 
services demanded of it, and should it ac¬ 
cumulate and remain at any point it 
would decompose and give rise to offensive 
odors. Moreover, in its various fields of 
usefulness, the once pure water may have 
taken up germs of disease which formerly 
habited the human body, causing sickness 
and perhaps death, and which might give 
rise to like dire results should they again 
secure access to man. What, then, shall 
be done with the fouled water that has 
been collected ? In general, there are but 
two answers: Either it must (1) be turned 
into a body of water so large as to dilute 
it beyond all possibility of offence, and 
where it cannot endanger human life by 
polluting a public water supply, or (2) it 
must in some manner be purified. 

This fouled water is called sewage; the 
conduits which collect it constitute the 
sewerage system; and the means adopted 
to get rid of the collected matter is termed 
sewage disposal. The terms sewerage and 
sewage, it may be noted here, are often 
confounded, even among engineers. The 


7 


use of sewerage to indicate the matter car¬ 
ried by a sewer, is obsolete, so that one 
might about as properly write or speak of 
purifying water-works as of purifying 
sewerage. 

To go a little further with definitions, 
it may be stated that conduits which carry 
water collected from street surfaces, dur¬ 
ing and after rains, or ground water col¬ 
lected from beneath the surface, or both, 
are called drains. Where one set of con¬ 
duits removes sewage and another carries 
surface and ground water, it is said that 
the separate system of sewerage is in use, 
a term which may be applied where the 
drainage system has not yet been con¬ 
structed, but only sanitary sewers, as they 
are often called, have been provided. 
Where one set of conduits conveys both 
sewage and drainage water, it is called the 
combined system of sewerage. Obviously, 
various modifications of those two systems 
are possible, both for whole cities and for 
limited areas within one municipality. 

To make the distinction between sewers 
and drains more complete, it may be said 


8 


that sewers carry water fouled with or¬ 
ganic wastes from the human system, from 
various cleansing processes common to 
all households, and also manufacturing 
wastes; while drains convey rain or ground 
water only. The drainage, however, may 
contain much organic matter gathered by 
the rain in passing over roofs, yards and 
streets, or by the ground water as it per¬ 
colates through polluted soil; but this 
matter, in most cases, is far less likely to 
give offense or menace health than that 
contained in sewage. 

Before entering into a discussion of 
sewerage systems it will be well to con¬ 
sider briefly why they are needed, for the 
engineer and the sanitarian must for many 
years to come meet the objections to this 
class* of improvements put forth by men 
either ignorant of the principles involved 
or, worse yet, of those whose first impulse 
is to strenuously resist any new demand 
upon the public treasury, without regard 
to its character. 

Public water supplies and sewerage 
systems naturally go hand in hand. Where 


9 


neither exists water is generally drawn 
from wells, often in close proximity to 
privies and sink drains, and subject to 
gross pollution from them. Should there 
be a case of typhoid fever in a given house 
typhoid germs, which always exist in great 
numbers in the dejecta of the patient', 
might readily find their way into the 
well, and thus into the digestive system of 
other members of the family, of visitors, 
or of neighbors using the well. Thus the 
disease is spread from one member of a 
family to another and from family to 
family. Besides this danger, there is 
always the more remote one from the 
dreaded cholera, should it visit the country, 
and the ever present one of poor health 
and consequent greater susceptibility to 
all forms of disease. 

A sanitary sewerage system cannot be 
installed until a public water supply has 
been provided. It is needed as soon as 
that is accomplished, for while the wells 
can then be abandoned the volume of 
waste water is greatly augmented by the 
water-works system. Its foulness is also 


10 


greatly increased through the introduc¬ 
tion of water closets. Without sewers and 
with a public water supply cesspools must 
be employed. With cesspools begins a 
continuous and far-reaching pollution of 
the soil, much more serious than that 
which commonly results from privies 
and the surface disposal of slops. The 
pores of the ground become clogged 
with organic waste; nature’s beneficent 
process of oxidation is arrested; putrefac¬ 
tion sets in; and poisonous gases are gene¬ 
rated. These gases may find their way 
through foundations into houses and also 
directly into the outer air, especially dur¬ 
ing sudden rises in the ground water level. 

The cellars of houses on small lots may 
be made damp by leaching cesspools. 
Such wells as still remain in use are also 
liable to pollution from cesspools on neigh¬ 
boring premises. Water tight cesspools, 
while possible in theory and often de¬ 
manded by health ordinances, are a luxury 
that only a few can afford, owing to the 
cost of frequent emptyings. Even in per¬ 
meable soils the emptying of leaching 


11 


cesspools as often as health and decency 
demand will generally cost more than the 
increase in taxes due to the construction 
and maintenance of a sewerage system. 

A village or town without water-works 
and sewers is at great disadvantage as 
compared with communities having these 
conveniences and safeguards. Industries 
and population are not so quickly attracted 
to it; the health of the municipality is 
almost sure to be poorer and its death rate 
higher. These statements hold, only in 
lesser degree, where a public water sup¬ 
ply but no sewerage system has been pro¬ 
vided. The full benefits of water-works 
cannot be enjoyed until sewers are put in, 
because many people will make the ab¬ 
sence of sewers an excuse for the non-use 
or limited use of the water supply. 

Who can describe the trials and tribula¬ 
tions which beset health authorities in 
their efforts to secure the proper disposal 
of privy and cesspool matter ? If there is 
little but privy matter to be removed the 
difficulties are not so great, because in this 
country such a condition seldom exists, 


12 


except in small communities, where the 
houses are set in ample lots, with gardens, 
and with an abundance of farm land near 
by, so that the vault matter is in demand 
for fertilizing purposes. With denser 
populations and larger areas, the emptying 
of vaults is a more serious matter, requir¬ 
ing the greatest care to prevent nuisances, 
and often, if not generally, entailing ex¬ 
pense upon the householder. Cesspools 
are unmitigated nuisances, and however 
well built or frequently emptied, the satis¬ 
factory disposal of their contents is practi¬ 
cally impossible. The matter has com¬ 
paratively little value as a fertilizer and 
dumping upon unoccupied land is met with 
increasing protests, even if the land is 
located in remote and sparsely settled 
towns. 

The Value of a Sewerage System. 

To express the value of a good sewerage 
system in lives or dollars saved is simply 
impossible. Other sanitary improvements 
precede, accompany and follow this, each 


13 


adding to the healthfulness of the com¬ 
munity. The decrease in the death rate 
for a term of years can be given, but no 
man can express in percentages the part 
played by each factor. We know that 
pure air, pure water, and a pure soil are 
essential to good health and long life. 
Among the greatest polluters of air and 
soil, and by all odds the greatest enemy to 
pure water, is the contaminating matter 
from privies, cesspools and improper sys¬ 
tems of sewerage and sewage disposal. 
These are such truisms that to expand 
upon them in these days of progress seems 
almost absurd. 

Only one illustration will be attempted. 
More than 35,000 deaths a year are caused 
by typhoid fever in the United States. 
Keep from the lips of our people all water 
containing germs from the excreta of ty¬ 
phoid patients, and milk diluted with 
such water, or contaminated with it 
through washing milk cans and bottles 
in it, and the disease would soon be prac¬ 
tically wiped out. This can be effected 
only by providing every one with a pure 


14 


water supply, which, with other much de¬ 
sired ends, would be greatly advanced by 
the provision of properly designed sewer¬ 
age and sewage disposal systems for both 
town and country.* 

Good Engineering Advice Essential. 

Simple and convincing as the arguments 
for efficient sewerage systems seem, years 
of agitation are often necessary to awaken 
sufficient interest in the subject to secure 
their introduction. One cause of this is 
the failure to present to the people a well- 
considered scheme, capable of being under¬ 
stood in its broad outlines by the average 
citizen and in all but its most technical 
details by any live business or professional 
man. How rarely this is done until years 
have been spent in well nigh useless effort, 
money as well as time often being wasted 

* For the salutary effect upon the general health of 
individuals, and especially of -women, conferred by the 
abolition of outside privies, more or less exposed to the 
public view, cold in winter, insufferably hot and odorous 
in summer, impossible of access without getting wet dur¬ 
ing rains or snows, see Waring’s “ How to Drain a 
House,” Second Edition. This book discusses other bene-- 
fits to health and otherwise, conferred by a proper system 
of disposal for household wastes of the kind under discussion 
here. 



15 


in this way. Good engineering advice is 
needed from the very start in this or any 
similar enterprise. Otherwise a chaotic 
mass of opinions as to what should be 
done speedily develops, factions spring up 
and even political parties take sides on the A 
questions involved. 

Preliminary Reports and Plans. 

Such preliminary studies as are required 
need not be very expensive, but they are 
essential to a proper understanding of the 
subject. Among the data which should be 
determined as early as possible are: (1) 
The area to be served, with its topography 
and the general character of the soil. (2) 
Whether the separate or combined system 
of sewerage, or a compromise between 
these two, is to be adopted. (3) Whether 
subsoil drainage shall be attempted. (4) 
The best of the available means of .final 
disposal of the sewage, often the most 
difficult of the problems involved where 
purification is necessary. (5) Population, 
water consumption and volume of sewage 
for which provision must be made, together 


16 


with rainfall data, if surface drainage is to 
be installed. (6) Extent and cost of the 
proposed system. (7) Method of meeting 
the cost of the sewerage system. (8) The 
needs for sewerage peculiar to the locality, 
with a study of the health and mortality 
of the town. 

These are the main points involved in 
sewering and draining a town. It may 
serve either as a mere outline, or the de¬ 
tails suggested by the various heads may 
be so worked out as to form a complete 
design for the system. 

There is nothing like public confidence, 
and the quickest way to unsettle a com¬ 
munity and to delay the introduction of 
public improvements, is to lay before the 
people a number of conflicting plans. A 
well-considered preliminary study is likely 
to at once commend itself to citizens and 
taxpayers, and if months or even years go 
by without further action it continues to 
be a rock upon which to build in the future. 
Succeeding engineers can but commend 
what has been so well put in the past, if 
they be possessed of sense and ability, and 


17 


the popular conception of what should be 
dong is strengthened with each endorse¬ 
ment of previous recommendations. 

The above being true, great care should 
be taken on the part of local authorities to 
select the right man for the preliminary 
studies, and the fortunate engineer should 
exercise even greater care in fulfilling the 
trust confided in him. The same holds 
good regarding final plans and actual 
construction. 

Generally speaking, the smaller the com¬ 
munity or the amount of money available, 
the greater the need for the best obtain¬ 
able advice, although of course the less 
intricate the problem the cheaper its solu¬ 
tion, even by the most talented expert. It 
is only a false economy that dispenses 
with engineering services, or employs the 
cheapest, because money is to be had only 
in small quantities. Experience is an ex¬ 
pensive teacher, and the community that 
realizes this at the start will pay the engi¬ 
neer and secure the benefit of his training 
in the school of well-directed experience, 
instead of taking a more expensive course 


18 


of its own in the school of headstrong, 
blundering, haphazard experience, which 
so many municipalities have entered. 

Let us now suppose that a village, town, 
or city has so far decided in favor of a 
sewerage system as to be ready to have 
preliminary studies made. We will also 
suppose that it has decided to have these 
studies of a comprehensive character. The 
authorities hesitate somewhat between em¬ 
ploying a local engineer of good general 
standing in his profession, and with some 
experience in sewerage construction, and 
an engineer of national reputation in this 
line of work. Wishing the best they 
half decide to engage the latter, but in¬ 
quiry develops the fact that his charges 
are high, although none too high con¬ 
sidering his experience and knowledge, 
that he must be paid for time spent in 
travelling, and that a comparatively large 
amount of ordinary surveying and simple 
compilation of facts and figures must be 
made, requiring a number of days from a 
principal and assistants. Both the local 
man and the expert are finally engaged. 


19 


the latter to act principally in an advisory 
capacity throughout the study. 

Referring to the above outline for the 
preliminary study, it will be seen that the 
local engineer will make the surveys, collect 
the information regarding population, 
water consumption and rainfall and other 
merely local data upon which the design 
for a sewerage system will depend. This 
he will submit to the expert for use in 
preparing the report of the latter. It is 
not necessary to separate any further the 
work of the two engineers. The evolution 
of the report and recommendations may 
therefore be considered as the work of one 
engineer from start to finish. Indeed it is 
likely to be so to a very large extent in prac¬ 
tice, the division of labor generally being 
carried far to one extreme or the other: 
That is, either the expert is called in to 
amend and approve the results of complete 
studies by an engineer with less experience 
than himself, or he employs his own as¬ 
sistants, local engineers or otherwise, to 
do the bulk of the routine work involved. 


20 


The various parts of the study in their 
order may now be taken up, as follows: 

(1) The area to he served, with its topog¬ 
raphy and the general character of the soil. 

A contour map of the whole municipality, 
showing the location of the several streets, 
streams, ponds, or lakes and contour lines 
for say each 5 ft. of change in elevation 
is essential to the best results and must be 
provided sooner or later if a sewerage 
system is to be carried out on intelligent 
lines. Such a map will be of service for 
other purposes and would be a good invest¬ 
ment for any municipality. 

The general character of the soil can 
usually be ascertained without much diffi¬ 
culty by more or less casual observation, 
and by inquiring among residents, build¬ 
ers and others who have dug wells and 
cellars, or observed the same while being 
dug. The kind of soil is important as 
affecting the cost of trenching, and its 
natural wetness or dryness, together with 
the ground water level, will be a further 
indication of the difficulties likely to be 
met in construction, and of the necessity 


21 


or desirability of providing underdrains 
for removing ground water or lowering its 
level, which is further considered below. 

(2) Whether the separate or combined 
system of sewerage , or a compromise be¬ 
tween these two , is to be adopted . 

Obviously, these points depend almost 
wholly upon local conditions, including 
financial as well as natural factors. The 
size and cost of combined sewers is truly 
enormous as compared with those on the 
separate plan, since the surface drainage 
in times of heavy rainfall is many times 
as great as the flow of sanitary sewage. 

In the older towns and cities it is some¬ 
times the case that drains designed to re¬ 
move only surface water were con¬ 
structed long ago, before modern plumb¬ 
ing methods were introduced. Such drains 
were loosely built, may have been poor in 
grade from the start and were never de¬ 
signed to receive sewage. To-day, how¬ 
ever, they are serving as sewers and giv¬ 
ing much trouble and offense through 
stoppages and stagnation. Besides this, 
they are polluting the soil by means of 


22 


numerous leaks. In designing a compre¬ 
hensive sewerage system for such a city, it 
sometimes happens that these old drains 
can be relegated to their original purposes 
and sanitary sewers introduced to care for 
house wastes alone. 

Where a town or city is entirely or prac¬ 
tically without either sewers or drains, it 
often happens that it may consider itself 
fortunate if it can put in sanitary sewers 
on the strictly separate plan, leaving sur¬ 
face drainage for future generations, it 
may be. Here financial limitations govern, 
and this has been the experience of many 
American municipalities now possessed 
of first-class sanitary sewers. 

Many a town is so situated that street 
gutters and natural water courses alone 
make ample provision for surface drainage. 
Again, the street gutters may be insuffi¬ 
cient, through various causes, and storm 
drains thus be necessary, but there may be 
numerous natural outlets for these at fre¬ 
quent intervals, thus requiring only short 
lines and thus comparatively small storm 
drains. At the same time the only suit&- 


23 


ble outlet for sewage may be at a point 
remote from the city, thus necessitating a 
long, large and costly outlet sewer, if the 
combined system were to be employed, as 
against a comparatively small and inex¬ 
pensive outlet for sewage alone. 

But strongest of all is the case for the 
separate system when the sewage must be 
purified. It is simply out of the question 
for any city to build works large enough 
to treat the full flow of a combined system 
at times of maximum rainfall. Some of 
the sewage must pass away entirely un¬ 
treated, or very inadequately purified. 
Generally speaking, each added drop of 
water is so much more burden, for while it 
is true that the sewage is thereby diluted, 
it is also true that the capacity of the works 
is taxed so much the more. 

If crops are being raised, or even simple 
intermittent filtration is in vogue, periods 
of heavy rainfall are just the times when 
a smaller rather than a larger volume of 
sewage is desired, while at chemical precipi¬ 
tation works heavy increases in the sewage 
flow are always unwelcome. The volume 


24 


to be treated is one of the greatest factors 
in sewage purification, and the original 
size of a plant, and largely its cost, vary 
directly with the volume, while cost of 
operation is far more largely dependent 
upon volume than strength of sewage. 
The essential point is, that the combined 
system means great extremes and sudden 
fluctuations of flow, and whatever the 
character of the industry such conditions 
are consistent neither with economy nor 
the best results. 

Sometimes more or less limited areas of 
a town may require the combined system 
through lack of facilities for near-by dis¬ 
posal of surface water, and again roof 
water alone may need to be taken into the 
sewers. As stated above, local conditions 
and relative costs are the governing fac¬ 
tors in deciding between the separate and 
combined systems. 

An old fallacy concerning the combined 
system may be mentioned, although it has 
now well nigh disappeared: It is that the 
storm water will flush the sewers. Regard¬ 
ing this it must be remembered that the 


25 


sewage flow is continuous and likewise the 
dangers of and from stoppages, while rain¬ 
falls are uncertain in frequency and 
amount. As a matter of fact special pains 
are now taken by the best engineers to give 
combined sewers such a section that the 
dry weather flow will be in a small chan¬ 
nel as much as possible like that which 
might be employed for sanitary sewers.* 

(3) Whether subsoil drainage shall be 
attempted. 

As for providing underdrains for remov¬ 
ing ground water, this will also in most 
cases depend upon local conditions. It is 
always an advantage to lower the ground 
water level in places where it is high enough 
to render the ground wet at or near the sur¬ 
face through a large part of the year. As 
sewers are generally placed below the level 
of cellar bottoms and underdrains are most 
commonly put below or at least not higher 
than the sewers, it follows that when of 
ample size underdrains will lower the 

* More extended discussions of tlm combined and separate 
Bystems may be found in Waring’s ‘Sewerage and Land 
Drainage,” Staley & Pierson’s “ Separate System of Sewer¬ 
age,” and the many reports of engineers on proposed sew¬ 
erage systems. 



26 


ground water level to a considerable depth 
below the surface and render house foun¬ 
dations practically dry. It may be neces¬ 
sary to supplement the street underdrains 
by branches running to the houses, and 
even extending through large lots. 

The advantage of rendering dry the soil 
beneath and around habitations need not 
be enlarged upon here, as it is so generally 
well known. But it may not be known to 
all that underdrains are often such great 
aids to good sewer construction as to war¬ 
rant their introduction for the benefits 
caused during construction alone. This is 
the case where the trenches are so wet as 
to render the making and setting of cement 
joints difficult. By putting in underdrains 
in advance of the sewer proper the trench 
may be kept dry and the work greatly 
facilitated, even where temporary pumps 
must be provided to remove the water col¬ 
lected. 

Where it is desirable for any reason to 
keep down the sewage flow to the lowest 
possible point, underdrains are also of 
value without regard to sanitary condi- 


27 


tions. This may be the case where the 
sewage is to be purified, or simply to be 
pumped, or where several municipalities 
use a joint outlet sewer, each contributing 
towards the maintenance of the outlet in 
proportion to the amount of sewage from 
its individual system. The latter condi¬ 
tions are found in a joint outlet in New 
Jersey, where Orange, Bloomfield and 
Montclair use the same trunk sewer to 
the Passaic River, and have as the only 
basis of dividing the cost of maintenance 
the amount of sewage contributed by each. 

Of course the aim in good sewer work is 
to reduce the infiltration of ground water 
to a minimum, but all engineers and con¬ 
tractors know that in very wet soils tight 
joints can be made only with difficulty and 
practically never with absolute certainty. 
The volume of flow in the outlet of the 
sanitary sewers at East Orange, N. J., was 
at one time fully half ground water, ac¬ 
cording to careful estimates, and that was 
after the sewerage system was well estab¬ 
lished. 

It must be remembered that with the 


28 


2-ft. lengths of vitrified sewer pipe now 
almost universally used, there are 2,640 
joints to the mile. These joints are made 
of cement, and are not for a moment com¬ 
parable with the joints of molten lead, with 
their subsequent heavy calking, used in 
water main construction. 

In view of the above it is evident that 
underdrains should be used where they 
may be expected to benefit the health of a 
community by lowering the ground water 
level; where they will be sufficient aids to 
sewer construction to warrant their intro¬ 
duction for this purpose, to which is also to 
be added their permanent benefit; and 
finally, where it is desirable to employ them 
to prevent an increase through infiltration 
of the volume carried by the sewage, in 
which case the benefit to health will also 
accrue. 

(4) The best of the available means for 
the final disposal of the sewage. 

Until recently this part of the problem, at 
least in America, meant only into which of 
the near-by streams or lakes or at what 
point in tide water could the crude sewage 


29 


be discharged at the feast cost and with the 
minimum of offence. Too often the matter 
of offence was given only scant consider¬ 
ation, and sometimes none at all. Un¬ 
fortunately many cities are to-day facing 
the problem in the same manner, but the 
advance of modern sanitation is rendering 
this more and more imposible. 

The cardinal principle in the ultimate 
disposal of sewage is that no public water 
supply should be endangered thereby. 
Strange to say, this must be interpreted as 
meaning that no city should endanger the 
water supply of either itself or its neighbors. 
This is almost inconceivable, for while one 
can imagine a city mean or ignorant enough 
to endanger the lives of the citizens of an 
adjoining community, it seems incredible 
that any municipality should be sufficiently 
reckless to poison its water supply with its 
own excreta. But both conditions exist and 
must be combated. This deplorable state 
of affairs may be explained in part by the 
general ignorance of sanitary matters 
which has prevailed until of late, and in 
fact is seen still to exist when one com- 


30 


pares what is with 'what should be. It 
does seem, though, that common sense and 
common decency combined ought to be 
sufficient to prevent a city from drinking 
its own sewage or forcing it down the 
throats of others. 

Coming back to the cardinal principle 
expressed above, it may be asked “what 
constitutes the endangering of a public 
water supply?” JNo very definite answer 
can be given at present, owing to our lack 
of knowledge regarding the exact length 
of time which disease germs from the 
human system will live in water. The 
Massachusetts legislature some time ago 
said that no excreta should be discharged 
into a stream within 20 miles of any 
point where it is used for a public water 
supply, but in the matter of new water 
and sewerage construction it has practi¬ 
cally placed the subject in the hands of 
its State Board of Health. There are no 
data to-day which will warrant an engin¬ 
eer in saying that disease germs may not 
be conveyed more than 20 miles by the 
waters of a stream and afterwards cause 


31 


sickness and perhaps death. The engineer 
and sanitarian will consider the distance 
which must be traversed by the sewage 
and the dilution which it would receive 
before reaching a public water supply, to¬ 
gether with the minimum length of time 
which would elapse before a disease germ 
could pass from one human system to 
another, a most important point. Unless 
distance, dilution, and time are great, sew¬ 
age should be purified or carried elsewhere 
for disposal. 

Of course there may be cases where 
sewage disposal seems to claim preference 
to water supply, in the use of a stream. 
Each of these must be adjusted on its own 
merits. The willful pollution of public 
water supplies, even if it seems remote, 
should no longer be tolerated, and where 
new sewerage systems are being built, it 
is unnecessary that it should be. 

Given a body of water, not used, nor 
likely to be employed for a public water 
supply, the case is far different. Knowing 
the amount of water and the probable 
quantity and character of the sewage, it is 


32 


generally easy to determine whether all 
the crude sewage of the city can safely be 
discharged into the water in question. 
Averages are of no use here. The water 
available during a hot dry summer, when 
the stream, pond or lake is at its lowest, 
and banks and beds are exposed to the 
sun, is what must be considered. 

Partial purification may be sufficient 
through a few months or all of the year 
for some cities, and works have been car¬ 
ried out on that basis. But most plants 
in this country have been built under con¬ 
ditions that demand continuous operation 
at their utmost efficiency. 

Where sewage is discharged into large 
bodies of water, either lakes or the ocean, 
it is generally necessary to make a careful 
study of the prevailing currents in order 
to determine the most available point or 
points of discharge in order to prevent the 
sewage becoming stagnant in bays or the 
washing ashore of its lighter portions. 
Such studies are commonly made by floats, 
as direction of current is generally the 
factor of prime importance. 


33 


When it is decided that purification 
must be employed, it becomes necessary 
to select the method best suited to local 
needs and conditions. This matter can 
better be discussed after the subject of 
purification has been taken up in detail, 
further on, and so will be dropped for the 
present. 

In concluding this phase of the subject, 
or postponing its further consideration, it 
may be said that until new advances have 
been made in the recovery of fertilizing 
matter from sewage, no compunction need 
be felt in discharging such into any body 
of water which can receive it without 
harm. Where such water is available it is 
often a mere question of the relative cost 
of an outfall to it and a shorter outfall 
with purification works to a nearer point 
of discharge where purification is neces¬ 
sary. Of course treatment of the sewage 
is sometimes the only course which has a 
shadow of practicability. Again all con¬ 
sideration of such a procedure is often 
rendered unnecessary by an especially 
available point for the discharge of un- 


34 


purified sewage. Where there is uncer¬ 
tainty it is best to keep on the safe side and 
provide purification at the start. Uncer¬ 
tainty to-day in these matters means 
certainty in favor of purification to-mor¬ 
row, so fast are we advancing in sanitation 
and so rapid is the increase of population 
and also of the pollution of our streams. 

(5) Population ., water consumption , and 
volume of sewage for which provision 
should be made , together with rainfall 
data if surface drainage is to be installed • 

The basis for population studies will gen¬ 
erally be the United States census for a 
number of decades past, with figures for 
as many intermediate years as possible 
filled in from State and local numerations. 
From these figures percentages of growth 
for decades or shorter intervals may be 
computed and population curves plotted, 
and from one or both of these, coupled 
with present local conditions and future 
prospects, the population for the next 
30 to 50 years may be forecast by decades 
or half decades. In small and rapidly 


35 


growing communities it must be remem¬ 
bered that the percentage of increase is 
generally less as the population becomes 
greater. 

It is desirable to design a sewerage 
system large enough to serve for a number 
of years to come, say 30, though parts of 
the work need not be made so large, as 
pumping or purification works where either 
or both of these are necessary. 

It is rarely the case that the whole popu¬ 
lation of smaller communities is connected 
with the sewers until years have elapsed 
after the construction of a system. This is 
due to lack of sewers on some streets and 
to that strange perversity of human nature 
which leads many people to put off the 
making of sewer connections as long as 
possible, notwithstanding the fact that the 
soil of their premises is daily becoming 
more and more polluted with excrementi- 
tious matter, and that the yearly expense 
of properly cleaning privies and cesspools 
is greater than the interest on the invest¬ 
ment necessary for making sewer connec- 


36 


tions. In some communities allowances 
for these delays may be made in designing 
pumping or purification works, but the 
pipe system should be large enough at the 
start to serve each street and district for 
an indefinitely long period. The advan¬ 
tages of the use of city sewers are so great 
that all property is bound to be connected 
with them sooner or later, leased property 
without these conveniences soon dropping 
in market value. In view of these facts 
the population figures are sometimes based 
on an estimatad number of people per acre, 
or per lineal foot of sewer, more especially 
where a separate system of sanitary sewers 
is being constructed. Safe figures of the 
latter class cannot be laid down for gen¬ 
eral application, but must be decided on 
after a careful study of the community in 
question, the character of its residence 
property and general population. Often it 
is necessary to divide a city into districts 
for its population and rate of flow studies. 
Thus the residence sections occupied by the 
wealthiest classes will be comprised of a 


37 


comparatively small population per acre, 
due to the large size of the lots. The 
population will grow more dense in the 
passage through the sections occupied by 
the less wealthy, the well-to-do and finally 
the tenement sections. The portions of a 
city devoted to manufacturing will in some 
cities contribute sewage and manufacturing 
wastes in pretty close proportion to the 
number of employees, while in others, or 
in different lines of industry, the sewage 
yield will vary more especially with the 
character of the goods being produced. 

The total water consumption is of course 
mainly dependent upon the population, 
and these two factors together enter large¬ 
ly into the amount of sewage requiring re¬ 
moval and disposal. No fixed rule can be 
laid down for water consumption, except 
that in general it is on the increase in all 
American cities, and in many places has 
reached immense and sometimes alarming 
proportions. It may be kept down by prop¬ 
er inspection and the use of meters for 
the prevention of waste, as it is absolute 


38 


waste and not beneficial use which is re¬ 
sponsible for high water consumption. 

The instances are rare where it is safe to 
allow for less than 60 gallons per capita 
per day as the average water consumption 
of a town, if most of the people patronize 
the public water supply. If a general rule 
were to be laid down 100 gallons would be 
a safer figure. Obviously not all the water 
which passes through a water-works system 
reaches the sewers. In summer much of it 
is employed for lawn and Street sprinkling 
and similar purposes, very little of which 
reaches the sewers even where the com¬ 
bined system is in use, and practically 
none where a separate system of sanitary 
sewers is employed. But while all this 
tends to diminish the sewage yield the in¬ 
filtration of ground water, already dis¬ 
cussed, increases it, and average daily fig¬ 
ures have been discussed above, while 
works must be built on the basis of maxi¬ 
mum daily, or even hourly, yields. Alto¬ 
gether, then, 100 gallons per capita will be 
none too large except in particular cases or 
possibly for the immediate present, where 


39 


a portion of the works can be built for 
future enlargement.* 

The total daily flow of sewage is not 
distributed evenly through the 24 hours. 
The actual percentages at different hours 
of the day vary widely, according to the 
nature and occupations of the contributory 
populations. In most towns there should 
be scarcely any sewage, if the sewers are 
tight enough to prevent infiltration, be¬ 
tween say 10 p. m. and 4 to 6 a. m., a 
, period of from six to eight hours. As a 
matter of fact few sewerage systems exist 
where the flow during these hours is not 
considerable. From two-thirds to three- 
fourths of the daily flow generally occurs 
during from—say nine to twelve hours of 
the day, the particular hours varying some¬ 
what in different communities and having 
little or no significance in designing the 
smaller portions of most pipe systems, but 
affecting the outlets and being of great 


* For an extended study of water consumption, with 
figures for a large number of American municipalities 
and with much other data on the relation of this sub¬ 
ject and of population to amount of sewage, see Rafter 
& Baker’s “Sewage Disposal in the United States.” 



40 


importance where the sewage must be 
lifted or treated before its final discharge. 
Moreover, there are generally from one to 
three hours in the day when the flow is 
considerably above the average for the 
heaviest ten hours. The actual amount of 
sewage for these hours must be taken into 
consideration in the separate system and 
the plant designed accordingly. For ordi¬ 
nary laterals, these fluctuations need not 
be taken into account, for in the best prac¬ 
tice these are generally more than ample 
for their duty. As the sewers increase in 
size and territory served, and as disposal 
works are reached, the flow during max¬ 
imum hours becomes of more importance. 
Roughly speaking, 10 per cent, of the 
total daily flow in one hour may be con¬ 
sidered a perfectly safe limit.* 

When the sewers are being proportioned 
for their respective streets and districts, 
density of population must be considered. 
It is generally necessary to arrive at this 

* Staley & Pierson, in the “ Separate System of Sew¬ 
erage,” give the maximum hourly flow as twice the 
mean hourly flow, which would be about 8.3 per cent, 
of the total daily flow. 



41 


in an arbitrary way, as actual figures, ex¬ 
cept for the whole town, are seldom avail¬ 
able except in communities long since 
sewered, or that may be considered as 
having reached their full growth. The 
proper figures must be reached for each 
community separately, so no attempt will 
be made to give them here. 

Rainfall data are liable to be very scarce 
in all but the larger cities and towns, and 
at points where the national and state 
weather bureaus have stations or ob¬ 
servers. Such defects in the records as ex¬ 
ist through lack of observations, simply, 
cannot be remedied, but it sometimes hap¬ 
pens that figures for near-by towns will do 
very well. But even when records are 
available they may not be sufficiently de¬ 
tailed for the purposes under discussion. 
Monthly or weekly totals are of scarcely 
any use, and even daily records do not 
completely meet the necessities of the 
case. What is desired where storm sewers 
are to be provided is the duration and rate 
of precipitation of the heaviest rains. A 
very heavy shower of 15 minutes may 


42 


cause more inconvenience and damage, if 
the sewers are inadequate, than a steady 
rain extending over a day or two. There 
is, of course, a limit to the size of sewers, 
imposed by financial, and in some cases by 
physical conditions. Oftentimes, where 
sharp, heavy rainfalls occur, their complete 
speedy removal is impossible, and the sur¬ 
face water simply must be allowed to 
stand for awhile. Sewers may generally 
be so designed that they will speedily re, 
move the total rainfall except at long in. 
tervals when an unusual precipitation oc¬ 
curs. 

After a careful study of all the rainfall 
records available and a consideration of 
the slope and character of the drainage 
area, especially whether closely built up, 
with paved streets, many roofs, small areas 
in forest and under cultivation, or the 
contrary, the rate of rainfall per hour 
which shall furnish the basis of calcula¬ 
tions may readily be decided upon by any 
competent engineer. A maximum rate of 
1 in. per hour may be considered as a 
liberal figure in some localities. The pro- 


43 


portion of this which will reach the sewers 
during a given time will depend upon such 
local factors as slope of land, whether 
its surface is covered with houses and 
paved streets, cultivated fields, or forests, 
and the permeability of such soil as is 
exposed. 

(6) Extent and cost of the proposed 
system. 

This is a matter largely dependent 
upon the local treasury, or the willing¬ 
ness of the people to incur indebtedness, 
levy general taxes, or pay special assess¬ 
ments for benefits, as the case may be. 
The ideal plan is to afford every build¬ 
ing in the community an opportunity to 
connect with the sewerage system. This 
cannot often be done at the start, and in 
most instances sparsely settled outlying 
districts must wait long and weary years 
before the sewers reach them, although 
their taxpayers may be called upon year 
after year to pay taxes to redeem the 
bonds, meet interest, maintenance and re¬ 
pairs. The oldest and most thickly settled 
portions of the community naturally will 


44 


be sewered first, after which the system 
should be carried as far out in various 
directions as the funds available will per¬ 
mit. The exact course followed will de¬ 
pend largely upon the legislative authority 
conferred upon a given municipality to 
raise money for sewerage construction. 
Practice in the several States, and often in 
the various cities and towns of one State, 
varies widely in these particulars. Some¬ 
times the city authorities have full power 
to lay out as complete a system as they 
deem best, either issuing bonds for its con¬ 
struction or levying assessments for bene¬ 
fits upon abutting property owners for a 
part or the whole of the work. Again, 
there is authority only for the construction 
of trunk sewers and other works for final 
disposal, the building of laterals depend¬ 
ing entirely upon the initiative of property 
owners. All the local conditions, legal 
and otherwise, must be ascertained before 
the extent of the system can be settled. 
All work should be planned and carried 
out with the future in view and should be 
complete and adequate in itself and in re- 


45 


lation to other parts of the system, so that 
reconstruction will not he necessary for 
years to come, if ever. 

It appears from the above, and from a 
simple common-sense view of the subject 
without regard to what has been written, 
that the extent of the system will be 
governed very largely by the local pocket- 
book and existing statutes, and that it 
should be made to suit the most pressing 
needs of the community and be capable of 
easy extension as soon as possible. 

The cost of the system will be~a matter 
for estimate in each case. Most sewer work, 
especially for sanitary sewers, is so simple, 
and there is now so much of it being esti¬ 
mated upon and carried out by engineers 
and contractors, that it is comparatively 
easy to figure up the approximate cost of 
a sewerage system. Local prices of labor 
and freight rates on sewer pipe, cement and 
brick, where the latter is used, are the 
main factors, and must be decided upon 
by each engineer in making up his cost 
estimates. The technical papers now pub¬ 
lish exhaustive detailed lists of bids for 


46 


sewer work all over the country, and 
the reports of city engineers, superintend¬ 
ents of sewers, sewerage committees and 
boards of public works often abound in 
figures or quantities and cost of work 
actually done. 

(7) Method of meeting the cost of the 
system. 

As stated above, this is often laid 
down by law, so that there is little 
choice to be had, except in the details. 
But ample latitude is sometimes left and 
generally the details of carrying out even 
fairly definite laws afford a chance for a 
considerable amount of variation, together 
with much study. 

Broadly speaking there are two methods 
of raising money to defray the cost of a 
sewerage system: (1) By making the work 

a charge upon the whole municipality, 
raising the money by taxation or a bond 
isssue; and (2) assessing the cost upon the 
property specially benefited. A combina¬ 
tion of these plans is very common. The 
first one is sometimes put into effect and 
the second with comparative infrequency, 


47 


except for single streets or drainage dis¬ 
tricts of a city with independent outlets. 
The trouble with the second plan is that it 
is not easy to determine the proportionate 
amount of benefit which each property 
owner receives, unless it be in the most 
simple cases. 

The cost of constructing and operating 
a water-works system is met by the yearly 
rentals charged for water furnished the 
users of the same, but the general aim in 
the case of sewers is to make their use as 
popular as possible. Therefore, the most 
common practice in this country has been 
to charge nothing for using the sewer. An 
entrance fee, sometimes designed to repay 
the city the cost of supervising the work, 
and sometimes intended to help pay for or 
maintain the system, is often charged for 
connecting with the sewers and paid once 
for all. 

The actual cost of house connections is 
always, so far as the writer knows, borne 
by the house owner. 

Where the general public and the prop¬ 
erty especially benefited, that is, actually 


48 


or potentially served by the system as con¬ 
structed, share the cost, it is divided in 
various proportions, seemingly without 
rhyme or reason, in many instances. It 
may be the city or it may be the property 
benefited that pays all the way from one 
to three-fourths of the cost, or perhaps 
through a wider range. With the separate 
system of sanitary sewers a popular plan 
and an apparently fair one, where the 
cost is simply to be divided as stated 
just above, is to assess upon abutting 
property the cost of the smallest-sized 
lateral sewer, or in other words of a 
sewer just large enough to serve the 
houses on one street of moderate length. 
The further cost of the system or ex¬ 
tensions, would then be raised in the 
general tax levy or by a sale of bonds. 

The assessments for benefits are levied 
upon the frontage bordering on the streets 
in which the sewers are laid, or upon the 
area of the lots, or are divided between 
these methods. The whole subject under 
discussion is a complicated one and has 


49 


never received the consideration it deserves 
from municipal officers.* 

But to one such an official, great credit 
should be given for having made a very 
exhaustive investigation of the problem 
and presented a solution which aims to be 
fair, conducive to the rapid extension and 
use of his particular sewerage system, and 
in many points admirably adapted to other 
localities. This study was made by Mr. 
F. H. Snow, City Engineer of Brockton, 
Mass., and the plan recommended was 
adopted by that city. A summary of Mr. 
Snow’s report is given below, the import¬ 
ance of the subject, the lack of both popu¬ 
lar and technical information regarding it, 
and the value of the report itself, seeming 
to warrant the devotion of a few pages to 
this purpose, f 

The population of Brockton is about 
30,000. The sewerage system includes a 


* A monograph, entitled “Special Assessments,” by 
Victor Rosewater, (Columbia College Studies in History, 
Economics and Public Law) will be of interest and value 
to those who wish to pursue the general subject further. 

t This summary is condensed from an editorial digest 
and discussion by the writer which appeared in “ Engin¬ 
eering News ” of July 19, 1894. 



50 


receiving reservoir, pumping station, force 
main and filter beds. The first cost of the 
system, so far as constructed, was raised 
by an issue of bonds. The summary is as 
follows : 

In arriving at the proper plan for Brockton, Mr. 
Snow studied with great care the various methods 
of assessments already in use, after first having 
shown that the benefits of a sewerage system were 
partly public and partly private, and should be 
borne accordingly. Public benefits are, of course, 
to be met by general taxation. The proportion to 
be paid by the public has been fixed by the Massa¬ 
chusetts legislature at not less than one-fourth nor 
more than two-thirds of the total cost of the sewer¬ 
age system. For private benefits a variety of 
methods are permitted by the statutes, such as 
frontage and area assessments, yearly rentals, 
entrance fees, or a combination of these. 

****** 

Either the frontage or the area plan alone is 
shown by Mr. Snow to be inequitable, diagrams 
being used to illustrate how by either plan differ¬ 
ences in the shape of lots may allow several houses 
on one lot and only one or two on another, each 
lot having the same area or frontage, as the case 
may be. The entrance fee is also shown to be 
unjust, unless it is graded in accordance with bene¬ 
fits received, while, in addition, a large fee would 


51 


be requited at the start, when there were but few 
connections, or else reliance on the general tax 
levy would be necessary. 

The method finally recommended by Mr. Snow 
is given in his report as follows : 

It is recommended that one-fourth of the total 
cost of the sewerage system be raised by first 
assessment, one-half by rental, and the remainder 
by general tax. It is also recommended that first 
assessmant be based on area and frontage of land 
adjacent to sewers —0.6 on area within 125 ft. of 
the street line and 0.4 on frontage ; that the first 
assessment be collected in one payment • and 
credited to construction account; that the unit of 
rental be 1,000 gallons of water reaching the 
sewer, this to be ascertained from meter gagings 
of the water department, and to be corrected for 
water finding another outlet than the sewer by a 
system of discounts; 70 per cent, to be deducted 
from water supply of shops and 20 per cent, from 
water supply of houses having sill-cocks. 

And it is further recommended that abuttors be 
not compelled to enter the sewer as soon as com¬ 
pleted ; that no one be allowed to enter without a 
permit ; that no rent be charged users before Jan¬ 
uary 1, 1895, rents starting from that date ; that 
such rents be charged from the first of the month 
following that in which the permit is dated ; and 
that all deficiencies be made up in the early years 
by general tax levy. 

It is further recommended that the following 
prices be assessed per unit : For first assessment, 
0.3 cents per square foot, and 15 cents per front 
foot; for rental, 28 cents per 1,000 gallons enter¬ 
ing the sewer ; and that $8.40 be charged for un¬ 
metered connections, subject to a discount of 20 
per cent, for sill-cocks. 


52 


****** 

These first assessments represent the value of 
the sewerage system to land, in enhancing its price 
without regard to whether the sewers are used by 
the owners of the land. The amount raised by 
general taxation will likewise represent the benefit 
to the community as a whole, without regard to 
the location of the sewers. Benefits from actual 
use of the sewers are to be paid by rental, accord¬ 
ing to the amount of sewage contributed, and the 
sums so raised will be applied to paying off the 
bonds, meeting interest, and to maintenance. The 
rentals will pay two-thirds of the total yearly 
charges, leaving the balance to be met by general 
taxation. 

It is eminently fitting that rental should be 
based on the amount of sewage contributed, since 
upon the latter depends the size of the sewers, and 
notably the cost of constructing and operating the 
pumping plant and filter beds. Fortunately at 
Brockton 65 per cent, of the water connections 
are metered and the records of the water depart¬ 
ment are well kept, so that the sewer rentals can 
easily be based on the water consumption. Obvi¬ 
ously on many premises some of the water used 
does not find its way to the sewers, hence the pro¬ 
posed deduction of 20 per cent, of the consump¬ 
tion for houses having sill-cocks for hose and of 
70 per cent, for shops. 

****** 


53 


The unit of 28 cts. per 1,000 gallons of water 
was arrived at by computing the probable yearly 
expenses of the sewerage system until 1900 and the 
probable water comsumption for the same period. 
It should be stated that the water consumption in 
Brockton is phenomenally low, only 25 gallons per 
capita. The yearly rate of $8.40 for unmetered 
houses was chosen because the minimum rates for 
metered water are such as to make it an object to 
water users to have a meter when the water con¬ 
sumption goes above a point that would call for 
such a rental. 

Coming to the amount to be raised yearly in the 
tax levy, the problem is simple, the amount being 
the difference between the total amount to be 
raised and that provided for as outlined above. 

Although this system has been worked out to 
meet the situation of Brockton, which is in a num¬ 
ber of respects unique, the general principles 
involved may be applicable in other places. The 
special conditions at Brockton are as follows: (1) 
No sewers are yet in use, although the city has a 
population of about 30,000; this renders possible 
the adoption of any desirable system without the 
unfairness, real or fancied, which follows a change 
in the case of old systems. (2) It is expected that 
the whole city will be sewered in a comparatively 
few years, so that the total cost of the system can 
be readily estimated, which is essential to this 
plan. (3) The large percentage of metered water 


54 


taps and the fact that the city owns the water¬ 
works, so that water and sewer departments can 
co-operate, while each desires to keep the water 
consumption down, are favorable to a yearly 
rental plan, based on water consumption. Modi¬ 
fications of these conditions might make the 
system difficult of application or might cause fric¬ 
tion when applied. Nevertheless the principles at 
the bottom of it seem correct, and this general 
distribution of the burden of a sewerage system, 
whether in these or other proportions, seems fair 
and likely to be popular. General public and 
individual private benefit are each recognized and 
the latter is divided into two classes, (1) potential 
benefit through increased value of a certain piece 
of property because the sewer passes by it and may 
be used, and (2) the actual benefit through use.. 

Two dangers which beset the extremes of the 
two methods most usually employed to raise 
money for sewers seem likely to be counteracted 
to a large extent by this plan: (1) When the 
whole cost is put in the general tax levy or is met by 
bonds, the interest and principal of which must be 
met by taxes, it is difficult to secure money for exten- 
tensions, every taxpayer wishing to keep the rate 
down, and those living on sewered streets having 
no direct interest in extensions. In the Brockton 
plan the tax levy is increased by only one-fourth 
the total cost of the sewers, the bulk of the ex¬ 
penditure being put upon those whose land is 


55 


improved or those who, by use of the sewers, are 
saved the expense of cleaning cesspools or privy 
vaults. The taxpayer feels that the sewerage 
system is, to large extent, self-sustaining, like a 
municipal water-works plant. (2) The other 
danger is that where property benefited bears the 
whole expense of sewers it will, in case of assess¬ 
ments for frontage or area, try to keep the sewer 
out of the street. But in Brockton a given prop¬ 
erty owner will be paying towards one-fourth the 
cost of the system whether the sewers are in his 
street or not, and once in his street he need pay 
only an additional one-fourth for property benefit, 
unless he wishes to connect with the sewer. The 
sewer once in, however, he will already be paying 
towards one-half of the total cost of the system and 
the additional expense for the use of the sewer will 
seem small. Moreover, by economy in the use of 
water his rental may be kept low, and most 
people do not consider themselves extravagant 
water users. 

(8) The needs of sewerage peculiar to 
the locality , with a study of the health and 
mortality , of the town. 

Little need be said on these phases of 
the subject. The adoption of a scheme 
and the raising of money for its realization 
may be greatly aided by showing that 
local conditions imperatively demand the 


56 


improvement. A study of the health and 
mortality of the town, and comparisons of 
the results with like studies of communi¬ 
ties enjoying good sewerage systems is 
often helpful in enlisting popular enthu¬ 
siasm for sanitary progress. But such 
work must be done wisely and false state¬ 
ments and impressions regarding the rela¬ 
tion between unsanitary conditions and 
disease avoided as one would shun poison. 
There has been so much ranting of late re¬ 
garding deadly disease germs lurking here, 
there and everywhere that many persons 
on reflecting that they and most of their 
neighbors still live, grow suspicious and 
feel inclined to discredit the germ theory 
of disease and the advantage of cleanliness 
in all the departments of life. It must be 
remembered that just as there are thou¬ 
sands of visible forms of plant life, of 
which only a very small percentage are 
poisonous, so among the many invisible 
forms of plant life known as bacteria or 
microbes there are only a few harmful 
germs. These few, it must be taught, 
give rise to dire results when allowed 


57 


access to private water supplies, like house- 
wells, through leaching privies and cess¬ 
pools, or to public water supplies by dis¬ 
charging crude sewage into streams or 
lakes from which such supplies are drawn. 
Furthermore, unsanitary conditions, while 
not giving rise to certain forms of disease, 
may render the human system unfit to ward 
off attacks of the same. Facts like these, 
reasonably presented, may sometimes do a 
world of good in an engineer’s report, 
while the too common exaggerations would 
disarm instead of assure the people. 

Adoption of the Engineer’s Report. 

The report of the engineer having been 
completed and submitted to the proper 
officials its adoption by them them may be 
assumed. Sometimes the plan recom¬ 
mended has to be submitted to a popular 
vote, "but more often where a vote is taken 
it is only indirectly upon the specific plans 
proposed, the real question being whether 
bonds shall or shall not be issued for the 
execution of the scheme. After the gene¬ 
ral report is adopted the next step is to 


58 


select an engineer to prepare detailed 
plans and specifications preparatory to 
advertising for bids from contractors. 
Frequently the engineer who made the 
preliminary studies is engaged as design¬ 
ing engineer and sometimes to supervise 
construction as well. This course has 
the advantage of continuing the services 
of one more or less familiar with local 
conditions, and with the plan for sewer¬ 
ing the town already partially worked 
out. 

Design and Construction of the Con¬ 
duit System. 

The first work of the engineer will be 
to design his pipe or conduit system. For 
this task the topographical map already 
mentioned will be a help, but this should 
be supplemented by a profiles of all the 
streets in which sewers are to be laid, in 
order that the proper grades may be deter¬ 
mined and the accessories of the systems 
designed. 

Numerous diagrams and tables are avail¬ 
able for use in designing conduit systems, 


59 


rendering separate computations with the 
aid of complicated formulae altogether un¬ 
necessary, unless the engineer wishes to 
make his own figures.* In the separate sys¬ 
tem it is generally best to use 8-in. pipe as 
the minimum size, in order to lessen the 
risk of stoppages, although 6 ins. is ample 
for the volume of sanitary sewage from an 
ordinary residence street of medium length. 

Pipe sewers are generally made of vit¬ 
rified clay, with a salt-glazed surface. 
Cement pipe (cement and sand) is also 
used in some cities. The size of pipe 
sewer was for many years limited to a 
diameter of 24 ins. but some of the manu¬ 
facturers now make pipe 36 ins. in diam¬ 
eter for general use. The 24 in. limit was 
in force because of the difficulty and ex¬ 
pense of making the larger pipe and the 
comparative ease of laying brick sewers of 
any size from 24 ins. up. Monolithic sewers 

* Mathematical discussions of sewer formulae are beyond 
the scope of this work. See Baumeister’s “ Cleaning and 
Sewerage of Cities ” for a brief but able presentation of the 
subject, illustrated by diagrams, and Flynn’s “Flow of 
Water in Open Channels, Pipes, Sewers, Conduits, el c.,” for 
tables. Staley & Pierson’s 1 ‘ Separate Systems of Sewerage ” 
may also be consulted. More recent books are “ Ogden’s 
Sewer Design ” and Folwell’s Sewerage.” 



60 


have been used for a limited extent, the 
conduits being built in place from cement 
mortar.* In very wet ground cast iron 
pipe with lead joints is used, either be¬ 
cause it is specially desirable to prevent 
• infiltration or because of fear of damage 
through settlements. 

The pipe should be laid to grade with 
great care, and a good alignment should 
be secured. Holes should be dug for the 
bells of the pipe so that each length of 
the latter will have a solid bearing through¬ 
out. When the material is such as to make 
uncertain a solid support for the pipe, sand, 
gravel, concrete, plank or piles should be 
employed for the purpose. If rock is en¬ 
countered in trenching, it will be necessary 
to provide a bed for the pipe which will 
not be washed into fissures by the stream 
of sub-soil water which is likely to follow 
the sewer when the ground is saturated. At 
Little Falls, N. Y., in the case of a vitri¬ 
fied pipe line for a water supply conduit, 
such a washing-Out of material occurred, 


* Concrete, both plain and reinforced with steel, has been 
coming into use since the first edition of this book was writ¬ 
ten (1895), but more particularly for large sewers. 




61 


causing settlements and the pulling apart 
of joints. The trench was opened through 
the rock portion and the pipe embedded in 
concrete. 

Subsoil Drains, or Underdrains. 

Where sewers are in wet sand or gravel, 
subsoil drains, or, as they are more usually 
called, underdrains may be laid beneath or 
alongside the sewer to advantage, as dis¬ 
cussed above. These are generally simple 
agricultural tiles from 3 ins. in diameter 
upward. They have no joints, being 
simply hollow cylinders, and are laid with 
their ends a fraction of an inch apart, 
wrapped with a cheap so-called muslin 
cloth, or other suitable material to keep 
out the dirt until the matter in the trench 
becomes thoroughly packed about them. 
These underdrains may almost always be 
emptied into the nearest stream, provided 
it is not used as a public water supply. 
This qualification is on account of the fact 
that the sewers may leak and sewage thus 
flow directly into the underdrains. Such 
danger may seem remote, but it was con- 


62 


sidered sufficient to cause the city of Bos¬ 
ton to refuse to pay a promised sum toward 
the cost of the sewers of South Framing¬ 
ham, Mass., so long as the sewer under- 
drainge discharged into a stream tributary 
to one of the sources of the Boston water 
supply. Boston had agreed to make this 
contribution in order to induce the town 
of Framingham to remove its sewage 
from the Boston water works. This made 
purification necessary, which in turn de¬ 
manded that all the sewage should be 
pumped to the filter beds and irrigation 
area. Naturally the town did not wish 
to pump and purify the underdrainage, but 
after some years of delay and an offer of 
an additional sum from the city of Boston 
the town constructed reservoirs and filter 
beds for the purification of the underdrain¬ 
age, all of which must be pumped a small 
lift. 

Perhaps one of the best examples of 
subsoil drains beneath sanitary sewers, or 
at least the best example which has been 
described and illustrated in detail, is at 


63 


Newton, Mass., where drains were placed 
below many miles of sewers.* 

Manholes. 

Manholes should be placed at all changes 
of grade and at all junctions between two 
or more street sewers. These are built of 
brick and afford access to the sewer for 
inspection. In addition they are some¬ 
times used for flushing. They are pro¬ 
vided with iron covers, the latter often 
being pierced with holes to afford ventila¬ 
tion to the sewers. When the covers are 
so perforated pails are often suspended 
beneath to catch the dirt from the street 
surface, especially when the manholes are 
,in macadamized gravel or dirt streets. 

On long stretches of straight sewers 
lampholes are somtimes put in between 
manholes, consisting generally of a vertical 
piece of pipe extending from the sewer 
nearly to the surface and provided with a 
cover. These are valuable aids to in¬ 
spection. 


* See Engineering News, January 2, 1896, for illustrated 
description of this system. 



64 


Sewer Grades. 

The grades of sewers should be sufficent, 
where possible, to give them a self-cleans¬ 
ing velocity, thus rendering stoppages from 
ordinary suspended matters impossible. 
Baumeister, in his “ Cleaning and Sewer¬ 
age of Cities,” makes the following state¬ 
ments on this subject: 

Practical experiments show that sewers of the 
usual sections will remain clean with the follow¬ 
ing minimum grades: separate house connec¬ 
tions, 2 per cent. ; extreme cases, 1 per cent. 
Small street sewers, 1 per cent. ; extreme cases, 
0.7 percent. Main sewers, 0.7 per cent. ; ex¬ 
treme cases, 0.5 per cent. The extreme cases are 
for sewers carrying only rain or quite pure water. 

The following empirical formula will give the 
minimum grade for a sewer of clear diameter 
equal to d inches and either circular or oval in 
section: 

100 

Minimum grade, in per cent. 

Flushing Devices. 

Where very low grades are unavoidable 
and at the heads of branch sewers where 
the volume of flow is small, flushing may 
be used with advantage. In some cases a 



65 


copious supply of water is turned into the 
sewer through a manhole from some 
stream, pond or lake, or from the public 
water works system. Generally, however, 
the water introduced is allowed to accu¬ 
mulate before discharge, being held back, 
for instance, by plugging up the lower 
side of a manhole until the water accumu¬ 
lates in it, then suddenly withdrawing the 
plug and releasing the water, upon which it 
rushes down the sewer carrying before it 
practically all obstructions, except in ex¬ 
treme cases. 

Instead of relying upon clear water, as 
described above, it may be sufficient at 
some points on the system to simply back 
up the sewage by plugging the manhole 
outlet, thus flushing the sewer with the 
sewage itself. 

The necessity of frequent and regular 
flushing has given rise to automatic flush¬ 
ing tanks. These generally make use of 
the siphon for self-discharge, although 
there is on the market a purely gravity 
flush tank, which tips by its own weight 
when full. Whatever the means of dis- 


G6 


charge the feed to the tank is regulated by 
a valve or cock on the supply pipe, so the 
tank will fill and empty once in a given 
number of hours. 

Y-Bkanches foe House Connections. 

Provision for house connections should 
be made when laying sewers, in order to 
avoid as much as may be tearing up the 
streets after the pipe system is in and the 
breaking of holes into the sewer. It is a 
wise plan to lay the house connections 
from the street sewer to the curb, or even 
across the sidewalk, while the street is dug 
up. At the least Y-branches for house 
connections should be put in at frequent 
intervals, say from 25 ft. apart upwards, 
according to the character of the street. 
When the sewer is put down deep quarter 
bends are sometimes provided and the 
house connection pipe carried vertically 
upwards until within a few feet of the sur¬ 
face to avoid deep digging. However the 
house connection may join the sewer, or 
any two sewers join each other, the direc¬ 
tion, of flow in connection and street sewer 


67 


should be as nearly the same as possible, 
and the entering sewer should be at a little 
higher level than the sewer entered in 
order to increase the velocity of the in¬ 
fluent sewage and thus lessen the tendency 
to retardation and stoppage which natu¬ 
rally results where two confined streams 
with matters in suspension unite. 

Depth of Sewees Below Surface of 
Ground. 

No general rule can be laid down for the 
depth of sewers further than that they 
must be deep enough to admit of house 
connections with a proper fall, and on the 
other hand should be as near the surface 
as possible to save the expense of deep 
trenching. Of course they must be kept 
below the point at which danger from 
freezing might arise, but the natural 
depth is usually sufficient to make such a 
consideration unnecessary, especially as the 
temperature of sewage is generally a num¬ 
ber of degrees above that of the atmos¬ 
phere at the street surface. 


68 


Ventilation of Seweks. 

The ventilation of sewers is a subject 
still fraught with many fears and per¬ 
plexities. In the early days of sewers the 
conduits were faulty in the design of their 
cross-sections, in their grades and in their 
construction. Practically all of these con¬ 
duits originally carried surface water, and 
through infiltration large quantities of 
ground water. Many of these conduits, 
as stated at the beginning, were built to 
carry storm water alone, in other words 
were simply drains. With the advent of 
ample public water supplies and modern 
plumbing, which, with its many fixtures 
providing hot and cold water at every 
hand led to high water consumption, 
houses were connected with the drains, 
thus converting them into sewers. Still 
later, the convenience of this practice being 
recognized, conduits were designed and 
built to carry both drainage and sewage, 
but these sewers on what we now call the 
combined system were little or no better 
in design and construction than the old 


69 


surface drains. The consequence of all 
this was that the uneven bottoms made 
long stretches of sewer little or no better 
than cesspools, and this cause, with poor 
construction, gave rise to stoppages which 
still further aggravated the stagnation. 
Decomposition, without the presence of a 
plentiful supply of oxygen, evolved offen¬ 
sive gases, which sought the upper air 
through all possible channels. Street in¬ 
lets* for surface water and manholes for 
cleaning belched forth gases whose malo¬ 
dorous presence was easily recognized. Too 
often these odors were noticeable in houses. 
To prevent such a state of affairs various 
methods of sewer-ventilation were tried s 
which it is unnecessary to describe here. 
In modern work of good design sewers are 
built with the intention of removing all 
sewage immediately before offensive de¬ 
composition has time to begin. The 
grades are as nearly perfect as possible, 
the interiors are reasonably smooth to 
prevent adhesion of putrescible matter, 
and the manholes have perforated covers 
to aid in ventilation. In some cities ven- 


70 


tilating shafts are provided to supplement 
the manholes, these sometimes being the 
soil pipes of the houses, the main trap 
being omitted for this purpose. The latter 
practice is recommended by some of the 
best engineers and sanitarians of the day, 
the theory being that by such means well 
constructed sewers are kept so filled with 
fresh air, and so free from bad gases, that 
no harm can arise if occasionally a trap to 
some wash bowl or water closet fails and 
the sewer air reaches a dwelling room. 
But notwithstanding these opinions the 
majority of sanitarians still object to ven¬ 
tilating sewers through houses and insist 
upon the main trap. 

It seems obvious that in the separate 
system of sewers, with its small laterals, a 
4-in. ventilating pipe is not needed every 
50 or 100 ft. on both sides of the street to 
change the air in a 10, 8, or even, as is 
sometimes the case, a 6-in. street sewer. 
The most common practice is to assess the 
whole or a considerable portion of the 
cost of such small sewers upon abutting 
property owners. Where this is done it 


71 


may be difficult to say to one man out of 
perhaps five, “you must for the general 
good omit the usual main trap from your 
soil pipe in order that the street sewer 
may be ventilated; or if you object to 
that you may run a separate ventilating 
pipe from your house sewer at a point just 
outside your main trap to the top of your 
roof.” Naturally, most men would object 
to such an alternative, preferring not to 
risk, as they might think, with ample 
support from engineers and others sup¬ 
posed to know, the lives of themselves 
and their families, nor to spend money to 
avoid such a risk while four of their 
neighbors were not called upon for either 
risk or sacrifice. To be sure some means 
might be devised to assess the cost of 
these extra pipes upon the town at large, 
where the people refused to allow the 
ventilation through their soil pipes, but 
this would give rise to some trouble, at 
the best, so that the wisest course might 
be to provide extra ventilation, if ex¬ 
perience showed it necessary, entirely at 
town expense, and independently of dwell- 


72 


ings. The matter of ventilation is further 
discussed at the end of the next section. 

Misapprehensions Regarding So-Called 
Sewer Gas. 

Before leaving this subject a few words 
seem necessary regarding misapprehen¬ 
sions on the question of so-called sewer gas 
and the conveying of disease germs there¬ 
by. And first, there is no specific and defin¬ 
ite sewer gas for which a chemical formula 
or combination of symbols can be laid 
down. The air in sewers contains in greater 
or less degree some of the gaseous products 
of decomposition whenever chemical 
changes are taking place in the organic 
matter conveyed by or deposited in the 
sewers. This air is harmful if breathed, 
just the same as any other foul ai^r, and to 
no greater extent, except for the slight 
possibility that it may contain harmful bac¬ 
teria. The disease germs which may be 
expected in sewage are essentially water¬ 
borne instead of air-borne, and develop in 
the human intestines rather than in the 


73 


throat, nose or lungs, and therefore gain 
access to man chiefly through food and 
drink. The germs carried by so-called 
sewer gas must obviously be air-borne and 
from their origin are not likely to be found 
in sewage, or if found they would be in 
small quantities; but while all this is true 
it does not make sewer air any more der 
sirable for breathing. The evils to which 
impure air give rise are invidious, attack¬ 
ing the weak and undermining the phys¬ 
ical system of both weak and strong, ren¬ 
dering them more susceptible to various 
forms of sickness, notably the zymotic or 
filth diseases. Thus it is evident that no 
matter how much the nature of the dan¬ 
gers from this source may have been mis¬ 
understood in the past they are sufficiently 
grave to demand all reasonable efforts to 
ward them off. The first aim should be to 
prevent, as far as possible, the formation of 
foul air within the sewers, and the second 
to keep such air as may form away from 
mankind. After good design and construc¬ 
tion of the sewer conduits, as such, have 
been secured ventilation should be called 


74 


upon for the introduction of a plentiful sup¬ 
ply of fresh air and the removal of foul 
air to points where it will be diffused 
throughout the atmosphere without offense. 
Stagnation of air within the sewers must 
be avoided. 

Dr. Billings’ Opinions on Sewer Air 
and Ventilation. 

Before leaving this subject some quota¬ 
tions may be introduced to advantage from 
the exhaustive work entitled “ Ventilation 
and Heating,” by Dr. John S. Billings, 
formerly Surgeou-General U. S. A., and a 
recognized sanitary authority. Among 
other things Dr. Billing’s says : 

The air of an ordinary modern, fairly well con¬ 
structed and ventilated sewer appears to differ 
from the street air chiefly in having a higher pro¬ 
portion of carbonic acid. 

* * * * * * 

Specific pathogenic micro-organisms have not 
been found in the air of sewers * * * * As 

regards house drains and soil pipes, the condition 
of the air in them depends greatly upon whether 
they are properly ventilated or not. So long as 


75 


the fixtures connected with them are in daily use 
these pipes are lined with a moist slimy layer of 
organic matter, in which bacteria of various kinds 
grow in immense numbers. If the supply of air 
is abundant, these bacteria are mostly aerobic and 
the substances produced by their action are, as a 
rule, odorless and are rapidly carried away, by the 
next flush of liquid, if soluble. 

****** 

In hospitals, before the introduction of antisep¬ 
tic methods of treatment of wounds, the pyogenic 
organisms were of course very numerous in the 
hospital drains, and there are several cases in 
which localized outbreaks of erysipelas and un¬ 
healthy wound action appeared to be connected 
with the passage of the house drain air into the 
ward. 

****** 

Distinguished English sanitarians believe that 
typhoid fever has been spread through the gases 
coming from foul sewers, but I know of no satis¬ 
factory evidence of such an occurrence. Diph¬ 
theria and typhoid fever are diseases which pre¬ 
vail more extensively where there are no sewers 
than in the sewered part of the cities, even where 
the sewers are badly constructed. 

While I do not attach much importance to sewer 
air as a means of transmission of specific disease, 
I believe that its continuous inhalation is dangerous, 
owing to the large amount of volatile organic mat- 


76 


ter which it contains, and for that reason, as well 
as to prevent the formation of explosive mixtures 
and of unpleasant odors, continuous ventilation 
should be provided for all sewers, house drains 
and cesspools. 

In well constructed sewers Dr. Billings 
considers ventilation an easy matter, which 
can generally be effected by frequent open¬ 
ings to the outer air, and always at each 
dead end of a sewer. Special tall ventilat¬ 
ing shafts, or ventilation through factory 
furnaces or chimneys he considers as of lit¬ 
tle value, stating that the influence of such 
shafts or chimneys extends only to the 
nearest air inlet. 

Ventilation through house soil pipes is 
approved where the sewers and house con¬ 
nections are properly designed, constructed 
and operated, and all are under the con¬ 
trol of the municipal engineer, provided 
also the houses on a given street are nearly 
uniform in height. Where opposite condi¬ 
tions prevail, so that the air in the sewers 
is bad, and the tops of the soil pipes of one 
house would end under the windows of 
another, the Doctor thinks that main traps 


77 


should be placed on all soil pipes and air 
inlets and outlets be placed on the sewers 
at intervals of 300 to 400 ft. 

Features Peculiar to the Combined 
System. 

Coming now to sewers of the combined 
system their most notable differences 
from separate sanitary sewers are their 
greater size and the use of catch basins or 
inlets for the admission of surface water. 
They are generally of brick, stone, or con¬ 
crete, or a combination of two or more of 
these, instead of being chiefly of vitrified 
pipe. Still another distinctive feature is 
the provision of storm overflows, by means 
of which the main sewers, when over¬ 
charged at times of heavy rainfall, may 
empty a part of their contents through a 
short conduit into some water course. At 
such times the sewage is diluted by the 
rain-water, while the stream which re¬ 
ceives the overflow is also of an unusually 
large volume. The relief thus afforded ren¬ 
ders possible smaller conduits than could 


78 


otherwise be used without backing up sew¬ 
age into houses or flooding streets and 
cellars on the lower levels of the city. 

Size, Shape and Material of Combined 
Sewers. 

The actual size of the sewer of course 
depends upon local conditions, as to a large 
extent does its shape and material. Where 
the depth of flow varies greatly it is de¬ 
sirable to give the sewer a cross-section de¬ 
signed to suit all flows as fully as possible. 
Experience has shown this to be an approx¬ 
imation to the cross-section of an egg plac¬ 
ed upright on its smaller end. With this 
section a maximum depth and velocity of 
sewage is secured for a minimum flow, 
rendering deposits and stoppages far less 
liable. With sewers having a flow more 
nearly constant and equal to their full cap¬ 
acity the form may be modified to that of 
an ellipse, a horse shoe with an arc of a 
circle for an invert, or bottom, a circle, 
or some modification or combina¬ 
tion of these, according to circumstances. 
For the larger sewers brick is by far the 


79 


most common material, both because of 
its cheapness and of its adaptability to any 
shape. Stone inverts are sometimes em¬ 
ployed on heavy grades, notably where 
much sand is carried in suspension, in or¬ 
der to present a more lasting surface to the 
scouring and wearing effect of gritty ma¬ 
terial. Concrete is sometimes used for in¬ 
verts, where leakage may be expected, or 
in material liable to movement, but more 
commonly it affords a foundation for the 
brickwork. The concrete is also sometimes 
extended up the sides of the sewer, and 
sometimes completely around it.* If the 
material is liable to much settlement, as in 
marshes and bogs, the sewer may be con¬ 
structed on x a timber platform, the latter 
sometimes being supported by piles, gener¬ 
ally having at least a thin layer of concrete 
between it and the invert. 

It not infrequently occurs that sewers 
must be constructed through rock. In com¬ 
paratively rare cases this is sufficiently solid 
to warrant the use of an unlined tunnel, 
where grades are sufficient to permit a 


* See foot note, page CO. 



80 


rough, surface. But generally stones and 
uneven walls left after blasting make lin¬ 
ing necessary, which is commonly com¬ 
posed of brick, with any spaces behind the 
ring or rings filled with brick or stone 
masonry, or concrete. 

Catch Basins ok Rainwater Inlets. 

A catch basin is generally placed at each 
street corner, with a grated opening, or 
otherwise, giving the surface water access 
to a chamber or basin beneath the sidewalk, 
from which a pipe or other conduit leads to 
the sewer. Catch basins may be provided 
with water traps to prevent the sewer air 
from reaching the street, but these traps 
are liable to lose their seal through evapo¬ 
ration in dry weather, unless they are re¬ 
newed by manual labor from the public 
water supply system. To prevent the 
carrying of street washings into the sewers 
catch basins should be provided with silt 
chambers of considerable depth with over¬ 
flow pipes leading to the sewers, and thus 
lessen the bulk of the heavy suspended 
matters in the silt chamber to be removed 


81 


by buckets and carted away at proper in¬ 
tervals. In the case of long street blocks 
catch basins may be placed in the centers 
of the blocks, as well as at street corners. 

Storm Overflows. 

Storm overflows are simple in theory* 
and often so in construction, the main 
point being to ensure an overflow into 
another conduit when the flow reaches a 
certain elevation in the sewer. Where 
main and intercepting sewers are at right 
angles to each other the connection is 
sometimes so made that the dry weather 
flow drops into the intercepting sewer, but 
the flood flow, with its greater volume and 
velocity, shoots over the interceptor, in 
part, and into and through the overflow 
sewers. The lower portions of main sewers 
formerly discharging at many points into 
a stream or lake are sometimes utilized in 
this manner when intercepting sewers are 
added. 

The junction of large sewers, and other 
complications in combined sewerage sys¬ 
tems, sometimes afford ample opportunity 


for the engineer and contractor in design¬ 
ing and building masonry suitable for such 
places. 

Sewers designed to remove surface drain¬ 
age alone are practically the same as com¬ 
bined sewers, without house connections, 
and need no discussion here. 

Pumping Stations, Receiving Reser¬ 
voirs and Force Mains. 

A large percentage of the sewerage sys¬ 
tems of the United States and Canada 
operate wholly by gravity, but it is some¬ 
times necessary to pump a part or all of 
the sewage of a city. The lifts involved 
are usually quite low, so that high-priced 
pumping machinery is not required. It 
may be necessary to thoroughly screen the 
sewage before it passes to the pumps, or to 
provide these with valves not likely to be 
injured by the miscellaneous bulky sub* 
stances in the sewage. 

The Shone hydro-pneumatic system, used 
successfully at the World’s Columbian 
Exposition and elsewhere in this country 
and abroad, may sometimes be used to lift 


83 


sewage to higher levels. In this system 
compressed air from a central station is 
automatically discharged into a receiving 
chamber with which the sewers are con¬ 
nected, whenever the chamber fills to a 
certain point. The air under pressure 
forces the sewage through the outlet pipe. 

Where pumping is necessary receiving 
reservoirs with more or less storage cap¬ 
acity may sometimes be provided with 
advantage, to equalize the work demanded 
of the pumps and perhaps to permit shut¬ 
ting down the pumping plant at night. 
Such reservoirs are generally covered, 
unless in very isolated localties, and may 
be ventilated by connecting with the 
smokestack, or the gases from the venti¬ 
lator may be conveyed to the furnace fire. 

Force mains are generally required in 
connection with pumping plants, but some¬ 
times the latter are so near the point of 
outlet, serving as mere vertical lifts, that 
the discharge pipes from the pumps cut no 
figure. When employed the force main 
will naturally be of cast iron, similar to 
that for a water supply system. 


84 


Tidal Chambeks. 

Besides receiving and storage reservoirs 
at pumping stations these may be required 
where the disposal of sewage is into tide 
water under such conditions that it is 
necessary to discharge it on ebb tides. 
The main distinguishing features of such 
reservoirs, as compared with these des¬ 
cribed above, is an arrangement of gates 
which will permit of emptying the reser¬ 
voir in a brief period. These gates should 
be easily handled in order to reduce the 
cost of attendance. This may sometimes 
be effected by mechanical power provided 
by the outflowing sewage. 

Final Plans and Specifications. 

Before bids for construction are invited 
full plans and specifications should be pre¬ 
pared by the engineer. The plans should 
be in sufficient detail to make the general 
design and all the accessories of the sys¬ 
tem perfectly plain to bidders, and the 
specifications should be explicit upon every 


85 


point which comes within their scope* 
Blue prints of the plans and printed copies- 
of the specifications should be ready for 
all inquiring bidders in advance of the 
date fixed for opening bids. The specifi¬ 
cations are usually accompanied with the 
form of contract to be executed between 
the city and the successful bidder. In the 
matter of specifications and forms of con¬ 
tract the engineer should generally work 
in conjunction with an able lawyer, the 
city’s permanent legal representative, or 
otherwise, according to circumstances. 
Years of experience on sewer work in a 
particular city may fit an engineer to cope 
single-handed with all the legal questions 
involved, but in the long run co-operation 
with members of the legal profession will 
prove advantageous. When difficulties- 
with contractors arise the city’s legal ad¬ 
viser is pretty sure to be called in, so it 
is well that he should be consulted at the 
start. Outside of his own particular city 
the engineer may be practically helpless 
in legal matters, owing to the wide di¬ 
vergence of laws relating to public im- 


86 


provements in cities of the same and 
of different states.* 

Securing Bids and Awarding Contracts. 

In no department of the engineer’s work 
can more money be saved his employers 
than in the securing of numerous truly 
competitive bids from able contractors and 
in deciding to whom the contract should 
be awarded. On the proper performance 
of these duties depends not only the 
first cost of the improvements, but the 
interest and maintenance account and to 
a large extent the successful operation of 
the undertaking. It is more essential to 
secure an able and honest contractor than 
a low bid; more important that the work 
be done well than that it be done cheaply. 
The number and character of the bidders 
on a given job will depend upon the im¬ 
portance of the work, the publicity given 
to the proposed letting and the character 

* A form of specification and contract is given in Staley & 
Pierson’s “Separate System of Sewerage” Prof. J. B. 
Johnson’s “ Engineering Contracts and Specifications is a 
valuable book devoted exclusively to the subjects named in 
its title. 




87 


of the plans, specifications and forms of 
contract. In these days of numerous con¬ 
tractors eager for work at a fair price it is 
only necessary to present a clear idea of 
the work to be done and just conditions A 
for its execution to secure an abundance of 
proposals on almost any job, provided 
only the opportunity to bid be brought 
to the attention of the possible bidders. 
Most cities and towns are obliged by law 
to advertise all contract lettings where 
more than a small cost is involved. It is 
generally required that the advertisements 
shall appear in one or more local news¬ 
papers and permissible that it be inserted 
in others. The local newspapers, even in 
the large cities, reach only a small pro¬ 
portion of possible bidders, almost ex¬ 
clusively those of the city in which the 
papers are published. For this reason* 
and because of the better results which ex¬ 
perience teaches are to be secured thereby, 
the practice of advertising engineering con¬ 
tracts in engineering journals is rapidly 
growing in favor of late. When such a 
course is pursued the work in hand is 


88 


brought to the attention of the contractors 
of a great section of the country, or of the 
whole country, if of sufficient importance, 
instead of to those of one city, and the 
number of bids received is in like propor¬ 
tion. But this is not the only advantage. 
The wider competition renders far more 
difficult, yes, practically impossible, ex¬ 
cept under the most corrupt city govern¬ 
ments, the growth of a ring of local con¬ 
tractors who through combinations, per-' 
sonal favoritisms and even worse, maintain 
prices at a high point, at the same time 
generally doing poor work. 

The bids having been received, they 
■should be referred to the engineer for tab¬ 
ulation and recommendation. From his 
estimates of quantities he can determine the 
relative aggregate prices of the several 
bidders, and from his knowledge, through 
acquaintance and inquiry, of the bidders, 
and of the probable cost of the work in 
question, he can decide upon and report the 
most favorable bid. As stated above this 
is by no means always the lowest bidder, 
and it should net be obligatory upon the 


89 


city to award the contract to the parties 
who offer to do the work for the least 
money. Unfortunately the experience of 
many cities in having their officials award 
contracts to favored bidders has led to leg¬ 
islative enactments affecting some local¬ 
ities which make it imperative that con¬ 
tracts shall be given to the lowest bidder, 
although often the privilege of rejecting 
all bids and readvertising is given. This 
.is a long step in advance, but where the 
officials can be trusted time and expense 
can be saved both city and contractor by 
allowing an award to other than the lowest 
bidder, if demanded by the best interests 
of the city, based on past records of con¬ 
tractors and the danger of poor work at ex¬ 
cessively low prices. Such a course, aside 
from obliging a city to accept an undesir¬ 
able bid, discourages designing contract¬ 
ors and those who, in their eagerness for 
work, figure too low, and does not call 
upon responsible men, of good judgment, 
to be to the trouble and expense of put¬ 
ting in bids the second time. 


90 


The Proper Execution of the Con¬ 
tract. 

The contract having been awarded and 
construction started, it devolves upon the 
engineer to give the contractor all neces¬ 
sary lines and grades, and any information 
needed and not provided in the plans and 
specifications. It is also his duty, both per¬ 
sonally and through his inspectors, to see 
that the work is done according to the 
plans and specifications. This requires the 
most careful and conscientious attention on 
the part of able men. Every detail of con¬ 
struction must be watched with an eagle 
eye and no work not subject to complete 
examination after it has been executed 
should be allowed to proceed in the ab¬ 
sence of the inspectors. On pipe work or 
conduit construction, especially, one in¬ 
spector should never be called upon to look 
after work in more than one street at the 
same time. Pipe and brick must be ex¬ 
amined with the greatest care, the former 
piece by piece. Cement should be sub¬ 
jected to proper test to show its fitness for 


91 


the use to which it is to be put. This re- 
quires at least a simple testing laboratory, 
and the provision of a fully-equipped one 
is money well spent where much work is to 
be done. After the sewers are completed 
they should be tested for obstructions, the 
small sewers by passing a ball through, or 
otherwise, and large ones by having a man 
go through them. 

Regulations foe the Use of Sewees. 

These include all necessary precautions 
for the prevention of obstructions, chief of 
which, perhaps, is the proper laying and 
joining to the street sewer of house con- ‘ 
nections. This work is often, if not gen¬ 
erally, done by plumbers, but all such 
should work under a license, revokable for 
non-compliance with city and town ordin¬ 
ances, and should be under the supervision 
of the engineering, sewer or health de¬ 
partment. The size, grade and material of 
house connections should be specified in the 
above regulations, and in order that pros¬ 
ecutions and punishments may be possible 
for offenses against these and other rules 


92 


it is necessary to have an ordinance or or¬ 
dinances passed, embodying all the neces¬ 
sary rules and regulations and providing 
penalties.* 

Operating the System. 

The sewers completed their operation is 
nearly always very simple, especially where 
pumping or purification is not necessary. 
A superintendent of sewers, in fact if not 
in name, is generally employed to have 
general charge of the sewerage system. 
This official often oversees house connec¬ 
tions and frequently has charge of minor, 

4 and sometimes of important extensions of 
the system. He removes stoppages and 
looks after flush tanks and other devices 
for keeping the sewers clean. If pumps 
are used these are likely to be in sole 
charge of the pumping engineer, although 
he may be under the superintendent. 
Where purification is employed a man in¬ 
dependent of the superintendent may or 
may not have charge. All purification 

* A model ordinance will be found in the “ Separate Sys¬ 
tem of Sewerage.” 



93 


plants should be under the immediate di¬ 
rection of the most competent men attain¬ 
able, within reasonable limits, as intelli¬ 
gence and knowledge are absolutely essen¬ 
tial to their continued, and often to their 
temporary success. Politics and political 
berths should be kept clear of this depart¬ 
ment of the sewerage system, if from no 
Other—it should be from all parts. 

Sewerage Committee, Board of Public 
Works or City Council. 

The above considerations suggest the 
question, should the construction and oper¬ 
ation of a sewerage system be entrusted to 
a sewerage committee entirely independent 
of other departments of city government, to 
a board of public works charged with other 
municipal improvements of an engineering 
character, or to the city council? The 
answer to this, like that to so many other 
questions already raised in this volume, is 
that local conditions often determine what 
is best. 

It is interesting to note that English 
cities and towns, as clearly shown in Dr. 


94 


Albert Shaw’s “ Municipal Government in 
Great Britain,” manage in an admirable 
manner practically all their public works 
through their city councils and committees 
of the same, always relying, however, 
upon able and experienced engineers and 
others for technical advice and the details 
of operation. In this country the mistrust 
of city councils has been, and largely is 
so great that the first thought of tax-pay¬ 
ers on undertaking the installation or ex¬ 
tension of some important public work is 
to entrust it to a special and independent 
body of men. 

The English system has the advantage 
that all public improvements are thereby 
carried out with due consideration to their 
relation to each other and to the finances 
of the city as a whole. A board of public 
works entrusted with streets, sewers, water \ 
and lighting plants, if the two latter be 
operated by the city, would be a close ap¬ 
proach to the English plan, and would in 
many instances have its advantages over 
that plan under American conditions. 
Generally speaking independent sewer 


95 


commissions, if only composed of tlie 
right men—and it is this which counts 
more than any system—have built and are 
managing sewerage systems with good re¬ 
sults in this country. But from the nature 
of the case they cannot always so plan 
their work, for instance, as to interfere as 
little as possible with good street pave¬ 
ments, because they have no control over 
the time and place of laying such. What¬ 
ever the system, an able city engineer, or 
engineer of the sewer department, should 
be given the practical settlement of all en¬ 
gineering questions. 

Sewage Purification in its General 
Aspects. 

Having treated the other phases of the 
subject as fully as the space available will 
permit, there remains for consideration the 
important matter of sewage purification. 
This has been reserved to the last, except 
for the incidental references to it already 
made, because it is quite complete in itself 
and demands independent handling. The 
main principles of sewerage construction, 


96 


aside from disposal works, have been es¬ 
tablished for many years, but the best 
means of rendering sewage fit to discharge 
into water courses or other bodies of water 
not suitable for the reception of crude sew¬ 
age are problems of yesterday, to-day and 
even of the future. Enough has been 
settled, however, to render no longer valid 
the plea that sewage purification is as yet 
in too experimental a stage to forbid efforts 
in that direction. We know to a certainty 
how sewage may be rendered harmless. 
Further knowledge will probably be in the 
line of making present processes do more 
work without additional cost. The facts 
are, that the two older systems of sewage 
purification now in use, land treatment 
and chemical precipitation, were practised 
for many years in a blind rule o’thumb 
way, and often with good results, before i 
their fundamental principles were dis¬ 
covered. Since the discovery of these 
principles, or natural laws, we can do 
nearly always what formerly was done only 
occasionally. 

Blood pulsed through man’s veins for 


97 


countless centuries before Harvey dis¬ 
covered the law of circulation, and many 
maladies incident to blood and circulation 
were helped or healed in utter ignorance 
of the law, but since and by means of the 
discovery what a revolution there has been 
in medicine and hygiene ! We look for¬ 
ward to more progress in these particulars, 
but we do not for this reason hesitate to 
avail ourselves of all that has been accom¬ 
plished. But this is exactly what some 
people would do in the matter of sewage 
purification, or at least they offer as an 
excuse that the science is in too tentative a 
stage to warrant the adoption of any plan 
as yet, their real motive too often being 
a desire to keep the municipal purse strings 
pulled tight. 

What is most needed now is not new 
processes, but the careful carrying out of 
well-known methods, with observations on 
the results obtained under all the varying 
circumstances which naturally arise in 
different localities and under varying con¬ 
ditions at the same works. We have a 
host of suggestive and many conclusive 


deductions drawn from careful and long- 
continued experiments, both at home and 
abroad, but we need, particularly in Amer¬ 
ica, to have more of the scientific spirit 
and method which have made the labora¬ 
tory work so successful applied to the 
daily operation and study of actual sew¬ 
age works. Instead of caviling at the 
uncertainties of sewage purification those 
who raise questions might better take their 
turn at efforts to perfect, simplify and 
cheapen the already admirable processes 
now available. They may rest assured 
that the worst yet attained by intelligent 
effort along the new lines of work is 
infinitely better than the shameful prostitu¬ 
tion of streams and lakes now going on 
throughout this broad land, a marring of 
the beautiful face of nature, rendering 
limpid waters black and repugnant, chang¬ 
ing their refreshing breezes to sickening 
odors, while life-giving water is made a 
death-dealing poison, and all through 
sewage pollution. 

Before taking up sewage purification in 
detail it will be well to consider what sew- 


99 


age is, from the standpoint of the chemist 
and bacteriologist, and what should he 
expected or desired in the way of its 
purification. Sewage, when fresh, and as 
it appears at the mouth of an outlet sewer, 
is generally a cloudy, opaque grey 
liquid, with some large particles of sus¬ 
pended matter not easily broken up in 
transit, as orange peels, rags, paper and 
various nondescript articles too numerous 
to mention. It very often has a faint, 
musty odor, and in both looks and smell 
is sometimes quite comparable with the 
suds-water of family laundry work. 
Nearly all of the sewage is simply water, 
the total solids in supsension averaging 
perhaps 2 per 1,000, of which a half 
may be organic matter. It is this 1 part 
in 1,000 which is to be removed or so 
changed in character as to be rendered 
harmless. 

These facts regarding the composition 
of sewage are far different from the 
popular conception, which pictures a vile 
mass, indescribable in appearance and odor. 
Such ideas are gained in part from the 


LdrC. 


100 


known contents of cesspools and from im¬ 
properly constructed and neglected sewers, 
but they arise largely in vivid imagina¬ 
tions. They would be applicable in many 
respects to sewage allowed to stagnate and 
take on putrescible decomposition, as hap¬ 
pens in cesspools and obstructed sewers, or 
where the sewage stands on the surface of 
poorly graded land disposal areas, or 
accumulates in any similar manner before 
being purified. 

The greatest danger from sewage is in 
the harmful bacteria which it conveys, 
but even these are not to be feared if kept 
out of the human system, to which they 
rarely gain access except through water 
used for domestic purposes or in connection 
with milk supplies. 

Generally speaking, sewage swarms with 
bacteria, engaged, when sufficient oxygen^ 
is present, in the laudible occupation of 
converting unstable organic matter which 
might become offensive into fixed mineral 
compounds of a wholly unobjectionable 
character. These plants may number 
millions to the teaspoonful, and yet be 


101 


wholly invisible, so minute are the organ¬ 
isms and so hidden is the mighty work in 
which they are engaged. To isolate the 
harmful from the harmless with certainty, 
if at all, is an achievment for some future 
Pasteur. 

The organic matter and the bacteria al¬ 
ways accompany each other. If all the 
bacteria should be removed or killed, but 
some of the organic matter remain, an¬ 
other crop of microbes would develop as 
if by magic as soon as seed was sown, al¬ 
though the renewal of disease germs in 
their orginal quantities would rarely, if 
ever, occur except from a source the same 
as or similar to the original. But, remove 
all the organic matter and all the bacteria 
food is gone—and without food death 
comes swiftly, even though the bacteria 
be legions. 

From the above it may be inferred that 
all sewage purification processes are valu¬ 
able in so far as they remove or change 
the composition of organic matter. Mechan¬ 
ical straining, sedimentation and chemical 
j>recipitation are largely removal processes. 


102 


while septic tanks, broad irrigation, inter¬ 
mittent filtration, contact beds and perco¬ 
lating filters change the putrescible organ¬ 
ic matter into stable compounds. 

Either form of land treatment may be 
employed where practically complete puri¬ 
fication is desired. Straining or sedimen¬ 
tation will remove only a small portion of 
the organic matter. Chemical precipita¬ 
tion and the use of septic tanks will do 
more, but must be supplemented by irri¬ 
gation or intermittent filtration where a 
high degree of purity is required. Con¬ 
tact beds and percolating filters, generally 
preceded by septic tanks, but sometimes 
by sedimentation or chemical precipita¬ 
tion instead, may be relied upon to pro¬ 
duce a non-putrescible effluent relatively 
free from suspended matter, but generally 
high in bacteria. Aeration may also he 
be called in to supplement other processes, 
but the part which it can perform is far 
more limited than is supposed by many. 

The object of sewage purification, then, 
being the removal of organic matter, and 
certain modes being available for the 


103 


partial or complete accomplishment of 
this end, the question is, which is the most 
desirable V Like nearly all the other ques¬ 
tions which have arisen in the course of 
this book, and like most other questions in 
engineering, other sciences or the arts, 
there is no one answer. The degree of 
purification required and the local condi¬ 
tions which make one system cheaper than 
another in construction and operation all 
have their weight in selecting a system of 
disposal. 

It sometimes happens that a partial re¬ 
moval of the organic matter contained in 
sewage is ample, in which case the 20 to 
30 per cent., more or less, that can be 
accomplished by either sedimentation pr 
straining will be sufficient. If better re¬ 
sults are wanted and some 50 per cent., or 
slightly more, of purification is needed, 
the sedimentation may be accelerated by 
the use of certain chemicals, which con¬ 
stitutes chemical precipitation, or the sep¬ 
tic tank may be employed. If neither of 
these will suffice, the effluent from either 
process, or in fact from sedimentation or 


104 


straining, may be applied to a sewage farm, 
intermittent filters, contact beds or perco¬ 
lating filters ; or where plenty of land is 
available, all previous treatment may be 
dispensed with and intermittent filtration 
or irrigation, commonly known as sewage 
farming, or a combination of these two 
land processes, may be brought into requi¬ 
sition to do all the work. Obviously where 
only partial purification is required there 
may be a wide range of choice between 
the methods named.* 

Although the object of sewage treatment 
may sometimes be the removal of bacteria, 
the chief aspect of most of the sewage 
works now in operation is to prevent nuis¬ 
ances in the nature of foul sights or odors. 
Where public water supplies are involved 
the aim is to keep the sewage out, or to 
purify the water, or both. 

Sedimentation. 

This is effected by allowing the sus- 

* See “ The Partial Purification cf Sewage,” by Col. Geo. 
E Waring, Jr., Engineering 2ieu8 of Jan. 4, 1894, for an ex¬ 
tended discussion of the subject named in the title just 
quoted. 



105 


pended matters to settle in tanks. The 
partially clarified liquid is drawn off, leav¬ 
ing the solid matter, called sludge, at the 
bottom for subsequent disposal. This pro¬ 
cess, as has been intimated, is akin to 
chemical precipitation, so the shape of the , 
tanks, the relative merits of continuous 
and intermittent settlement and the treat¬ 
ment of the sludge will be taken up later 
on. 

Experiments with sedimentation at Law¬ 
rence, Mass., during the last three months 
of 1893, indicated a subsidence of 18.2 per 
cent, of the albuminoid ammonia and 12 per 
cent, of the bacteria in the crude sewage 
during a period of four hours. The same 
experiments in 1894 showed a much better 
average for organic matter, as measured 
by the albuminoid ammonia, but about the 
same results for bacteria, the respective fig¬ 
ures being 30 and 14.6 per cent. In 1895, 
there were removed 48 per cent, of the total 
albuminoid ammonia, and 31 per cent, bac¬ 
teria; in 1897, about 35 per cent, of each.* 

* Reports of the Massachusetts State Board of Health, 
1893, p. 406, for 1894, p. 454, 1805, p. 451, and 1897, p. 415. 



106 


These experiments were discontinued early 
tinued early in 1898. 

It is hard to imagine conditions in actual 
practice which would warrant the con¬ 
struction of tanks of sufficient capacity to 
admit of four hours settlement where only 
a 30 to 40 per cent, removal of the organic 
matter could be expected. With smaller 
tanks the work done would of course be 
less, so sedimentation is not likely to be 
employed except where a small amount of 
purification at a slight expense is all that 
is needed. 

Mechanical Straining. 

This admits of a great variety of prac¬ 
tice, ranging from attempts to remove 
rags, paper and other large substances to 
an approximation to intermittent filtration. 
Wire screens or filters of various materials 
may be employed. Generally little is ac¬ 
complished, but in well-constructed and 
operated plants screening or straining may 
be an important factor in the purification 
effected. As a preliminary to intermittent 
filtration, coke strainers, or thin filter bedSj 


107 


were used at Lawrence during the last 
seven months of 1894, removing 62.4 per 
cent, of the albuminoid ammonia in tho 
original sewage.* These beds ranged from 
1 % to 8 ins. in thickness during the experi¬ 
ments, and the sewage passed them at ati 
average rate of about 345,000 gallons a 
day for six days in the week. A depth of 
6 ins. of coke is given as desirable and it 
is estimated that when straining ordinary 
sewage from 5 to 8 cu. yds. of coke would 
have to be removed per 1,000,000 gallons 
filtered. 

Mechanical straining through coke or 
sand at the rates named might perhaps 
more properly be termed continuous rapid 
filtration. Some of the better of the re¬ 
sults given are about the same as those 
secured in the same experiments by means 
of chemical precipitation, using 1,000 lbs. 
of sulphate of alumina per 1,000,000 gal- 


* Keport of the Massachusetts State Board of Health for 
1894, p. 455. The reports of the Massachusetts State Board 
of Health from 1894 to 1902, Inclusive, contain accounts of 
various further experiments with coke, anthracite and 
bituminous coal as screens. From 3 to 15 ins. of these ma¬ 
terials, working at rates of 1,000,000 gallons a day and up¬ 
wards, removed from 82 to 62 jier cent, of the total album¬ 
inoid ammonia. 



108 


Ions of sewage, or 7 grains per gallon, and 
allowing four hours for precipitation. The 
mechanical straining usually employed is 
insignificant in results compared with the 
above. The same may said of sedimen¬ 
tation. Both processes in these experi¬ 
ments, as well as the chemical tests carried 
on simultaneously, were intended to facili¬ 
tate and relieve the work of filter beds. 

Chemical Precipitation. 

Sedimentation alone removes only such 
suspended matter as will sink by its own 
weight during the comparatively brief 
time which can be allowed for the purpose. 
Some of the lighter matters may of course 
be carried down by the heavier particles,but 
the total results are comparatively small. 
If the process could be continued long 
enough, practically all matters in suspension 
might be removed, but those in solution 
would remain and putrefaction might be¬ 
gin in the sludge, if not in the sewage 
undergoing clarification. By adding cer¬ 
tain substances chemical action sets in and 
precipitation occurs. Some of the organic 


109 


substances are brought together by the 
formation of new compounds, and as they 
fall in flaky masses they carry with them 
other suspended matter. As in sedimen¬ 
tation or straining, a part of the bacteria 
are removed by mere entanglement, while 
every grain of organic matter removed 
decreases by so much the bacterial food 
supplies, and thus the potential number of 
bacteria. 

A great number and variety of chem¬ 
icals have been employed as precipitants, 
but years of experience have resulted in 
the general adoption of lime, sulphate of 
alumina and some of the salts of iron, 
more especially ferrous sulphate or cop¬ 
peras, or a combination of two of these, as 
best suited for the chemical precipitation 
of sewage. The character of the sewage 
and the relative cost of the several chemi¬ 
cals in a given locality should be deter¬ 
mining factors. Lime is cheap almost 
everywhere, but the comparatively large 
quantities required increase greatly the 
amount of sludge. Sulphate of alumina 
is not so readily obtained, and often must 


110 


l>e transported such a distance as to make 
freight rates quite a factor in its cost. It 
is often used in conjunction with lime, 
producing a less amount of sludge than 
lime alone and in some cases doing more 
effective work. Where either an acid 
sewage or one containing iron salts is to 
be treated, lime may be used without the 
sulphate of alumina and a considerable 
saving effected. If the acid or i ron salts are 
discharged at intervals the sewage must be 
tested from time to time to determine 
when to modify the amount of chemicals 
artificially applied. A very interesting 
example of this sort is found at Worcester, 
Mass., where large quantities of acid and 
iron are discharged into the city sewers 
from manufacturing establishments.* 

In buying chemicals of any kind great 
care should be exercised in determining the 
available amount of the active agent, as 
the amount of calcium oxide in lime, or of 
alumina in sulphate of alumina, different 
products varying greatly in this respect, 

* See Engineering News , No. 15, 1890, and July 28, 1892 ; 
also Rafter and Baker’s “ Sewage Disposal in the United 
States.” 



Ill 


notably the lime from different quarries 
and kilns.* 

The chemicals should be added to and 
thoroughly mixed with the sewage before 
the latter reaches the settling tank. The 
mixing may be effected in nearly all cases 
by projections into the channel leading to 
the tank, called baffle plates. 

Experience has demonstrated that the 
tanks should be long and narrow, and that 
they should be operated on the continuous 
rather than the intermittent plan. The 
width of the tank may be, say one-fourth 
its length. In the continnous plan the 
sewage is constantly flowing into one part 
of the tank and discharging from another 
in a more or less clarified state. In the 
intermittent system a tank is filled and 
then the flow turned elsewhere, allowing 
the sewage in the first tank to come to 
rest. Where the continuous plan is used 
the sewage generally flows through a set 

* For the theory of the actions of the various re-agents, 
the quantities employed and their costs, both in experimen¬ 
tal and practical work, see Rafter and Baker’s “SewageDis¬ 
posal in the United States.” The brief limits of this volume 
render impossible much more than a discussion of general 
principles; detailed figures, unaccompanied by the data 
upon which they are based, are apt to be misleading. 



' 112 


of tanks without change of gates or other 
interruption until one compartment needs 
cleaning. This compartment being cut out 
and left to itself for a while, the clarified 
.■* sewage is then drawn off gradually from 
the top through a hinged pipe, the upper 
and open end of which takes sewage from 
the surface on opening a valve in the hor¬ 
izontal portion of the drain pipe beyond 
the hinged joint. When the effluent is 
decanted to the top of the deposited sludge 
the valve just mentioned is closed and 
another one, in the sludge pipe, opened, 
allowing the sludge to flow out, or to be 
pumped out for final disposition. The 
tank should then be thoroughly cleaned, 
after which it may be treated with disin¬ 
fectants or deodorants, if desired, before 
being again put in use. 

The disposition of sludge is one of the 
most vexed problems connected with sew¬ 
age disposal. It is a pasty, semi-liquid 
mass, ordinarily containing from 90 to 95 
per cent, of water and 10 to 5 per cent, of 
solid matter. The most common method 
of disposal, and perhaps the one most gen- 


113 


erally available and satisfactory, is to 
squeeze as much water as is possible out 
of the sludge by means of presses designed 
for the work. This greatly reduces the 
bulk of the material. The liquid from the 
press goes back to the tank for further 
treatment. The sludge cake, as it is called, 
may be handled easily. It is sometimes 
burned and sometimes hauled away by 
farmers for use as a fertilizer. There have 
been great expectations on the part of pro¬ 
jectors of chemical precipitation works 
that the farmers would vie with each other 
in securing the sludge, and even pay good 
money for it. The general experience, 
both in this country and abroad, has been 
that a city is lucky if it is able to induce 
anyone to haul the sludge away for it. 

In some cases peat or some other absor¬ 
bent is mixed with the sludge to render it 
more easily handled and removed in bulk. 
Again, it is run out on the surface of coarse 
sand and gravel beds and its liquid parts 
reduced by draining and drying. Some of 
the difficulties connected with this last 
method are : 


114 


(1) In wet weather little drying takes 
place, and during the colder months the 
sludge accumulates in considerable quan¬ 
tities. (2) Manual labor must be em¬ 
ployed to remove the sludge from the 
draining and drying beds. (3) Where 
chemical precipitation is employed suitable 
land, in character and extent, is often not 
to be had. 

At Birmingham, England, large volumes 
of sludge are pumped through force mains 
distributed through portable pipes to 
and covered with earth. 

There remains another method available 
for some seaside cities, and that is dump¬ 
ing in the ocean by means of large steam 
sludge ships. Thousands upon thousands 
of tons are so disposed of from the sewage 
works of London and Manchester, Eng¬ 
land, and Glasgow, Scotland. 

The capacity of the settling tanks is 
often the chief factor in determining the 
cost of installing precipitation works. As¬ 
suming that the sewage should be one hour 
in passage through the tanks, and that the 
maximum flow is twice the average, pro- 


115 


vision must be made for one-twelfth the to¬ 
tal daily flow, where house sewage only is 
treated. This makes no allowance for throw¬ 
ing out a portion of the tanks for cleaning 
or repairs. It would certainly be erring 
on the safe side, if at all, to provide a tank 
capacity equal to one-eighth the total max¬ 
imum daily flow. Where sewage from a 
combined system is treated, it is of course 
practically impossible to provide a tank 
capacity sufficiently large to treat all the 
sewage. Either the excess of storm water 
must be discharged into natural water 
courses along the lines of the sewers or 
2 ^ass by the works without treatment. If 
ample tank capacity is available it may be 
possible to treat all the sewage during the 
first part of a moderate rain. This would 
mean the purification of the foulest portion 
of street and other washings, after which 
in many localities it might be admissible 
to forego all attempts at purifying the 
sewage, as the results which could be ob¬ 
tained would be comparatively insignifi¬ 
cant. During such a heavy rainfall the 
sewage of a combined system would be 


116 


many times diluted, and where the effluent 
from the works discharges into a stream 
the latter is also greatly increased in vol¬ 
ume. It is evident that where purification 
is proposed in connection with a new sew¬ 
erage system the separate plan will prac¬ 
tically always be adopted. Most purifica¬ 
tion plants in this country have been built 
at the same time as the collecting system, 
and in such cases the separate plan has 
been used. Worcester, Mass., was forced 
to adopt purification after many miles of 
combined sewers had been built, and after 
it had converted a brook with a consider¬ 
able drainage area into an outlet sewer. 
Its later sewers have been built for house 
wastes only, and hundreds of thousands of 
dollars have been spent since the sewage 
works were built in excluding surface 
water from the sewers. 

The Septic Tank. 

The septic tank, as we now know it, has 
been developed since 1894. In effect, it is 
a sedimentation basin, so designed and 
operated as to lessen the sludge deposit by 


117 


dissolving a portion of it and by reducing 
another portion to gaseous form. This re¬ 
duction or hydrolysis of the sludge is 
brought about by anaerobic bacteria, which 
work in the absence of air, and are thus 
directly opposed in character to the aero¬ 
bic bacteria or nitrifying organism of sew¬ 
age farms, intermittent filters, contact beds 
and percolating filters. Since inorganic 
matter is not acted upon by the bacteria, 
its exclusion from the septic tank is desir¬ 
able. To this end, small grit chambers are 
provided, through which the sewage passes 
on its way to the septic tank. The high 
specific gravity of the sand and other min¬ 
eral matter in the sewage causes much of 
it to sink in a brief period of time, while 
the remainder of the suspended matter, in¬ 
cluding the lighter organic sludge, passes 
into the septic tank. Since the admission 
of air to the septic tank would tend to dis¬ 
place the anaerobic bacteria by aerobic, 
the tank inlets and outlets are generally 
submerged a foot or so beneath the normal 
sewage level. The tanks are made long 
and narrow, thus affording time for sedi- 


118 


mentation, and have a sewage depth of 6 
to 9 feet. For convenience in removing 
sludge, their bottoms slope to one or more 
sumps or gates. 

Whether or not septic tanks should be 
covered has not been universally agreed. 
It is held by some that a roof, excluding 
light and air, is a great help, if not a ne¬ 
cessity, to the highest efficiency; while 
others argue that roofing is unnecessary 
to full bacterial action, except in very cold 
climates, and that a roof need be provided, 
If at all, only for such tanks as are near 
dwellings or much-traveled highways, and 
which on that account might give offense 
to residents or passers by. 

Any fairly water-tight material may be 
used in constructing septic tanks; probably 
concrete, either plain or reinforced, is now 
used more commonly than any other ma¬ 
terial. The roof, as well as the walls and 
bottom, may be of concrete, or where low 
first cost is an object, wood may be used 
for roofing. 

Since the action of the septic tank is due 
tc anaerobic bacteria, while further purifi- 


119 


cation is effected by aerobic germs, and 
since the septic effluent is not only high in 
anaerobic germ contents, and nearly if not 
quite without available oxygen, the septic 
effluent is sometimes aerated before being 
passed to filter beds. Weirs over which 
the effluent flows in a very shallow stream 
or a series of overflow steps are used for 
purposes of aeration. 

The amount of sludge removed by septic 
tanks cannot yet be safely predicted for a 
given sewage works until actual tests have 
been made. Such figures as are available 
show wide variations at different localities. 
No one should be deluded by observations 
of the amount of sludge remaining in a 
septic tank, since large volumes of sludge 
in a finely divided state may pass off in 
the effluent. Volume for volume, however, 
this finely divided suspended matter will 
make far less trouble than the sludge from 
ordinary settling tanks or from chemical 
precipitation works. Some of it is already 
a mineral ash, subject to no further organic 
change, and the balance is partly reduced 


120 


to mineral matter and also to food for the 
low forms of organic life. 

Such sludge as remains in septic tanks 
may be disposed of by the means already 
described. 

In some cases, probably due to the char¬ 
acter of the sewage or to improper opera¬ 
tion, sludge from septic tanks is offensive 
when first exposed to the air. Under such 
a condition the sludge disposal should be 
carried on at a remote point, or the sludge 
should be buried quickly a few inches 
beneath the earth. Investigations should 
also be made to determine whether the 
odors cannot be prevented by a change in 
the design or operation of the tank. 

Were it within the scope of this book, 
and less free from conflicting claims, it 
would be interesting to attempt to trace 
the history of the septic tank. The sub¬ 
ject involves claimants in Great Britain, 
the United States, Germany and France; 
and also many early tanks installed and 
used with success, though with little or no 
understanding of the principles involved, 
long before the name septic tank came into 


121 


use. It is now generally recognized that 
the man who gave the septic tank its name 
and brought it into scientific prominence 
was Donald Cameron, of Exeter, England, 
but up to early in the year 1905 it was not 
generally conceded that Cameron’s work 
entitled him to patent control of the septic 
tank process. The question was then in 
the courts of the United States for trial, 
but had never been legally raised in Great 
Britain, so far as the author of this book 
could learn. 


Artificial Aeration. — “ Electrical ” 
Processes. 

"While the oxygen of the atmosphere 
may be made one of the greatest agents in 
purifying sewage, some writers and others 
have laid too much stress upon the value 
of artificial aeration. Mountain streams, 
which tumble over rocky beds, are noted 
for their purity, and this has been attributed 
largely to the aeration which the water 
receives. It should be remembered that 


122 


the waters of such streams are generally of 
-a high degree of purity to start with, often 
being little different from rainwater just 
from the clouds, and that the aerating 
process is quite commonly a long one. It 
has been further observed that even badly 
polluted streams show greatly improved 
chemical analyses at points a number of 
miles below the source of contamination. 
But here, sedimentation, and the action of 
both animal and vegetable life in their 
more minute forms, play a notable part in 
the purification process, and the time- 
.element is also important. 

It has been well established by the 
Massachusetts State Board of Health in 
its Lawrence work that the two essentials 
for the removal or transformation of the 
organic matter in sewage are oxygen and 
time, where dependence is placed on a 
nitrifying or oxidizing process. The time- 
element has been largely ignored by some 
theorists, a few of whom have put their 
theories into practice. Purification plants 
have been built, and more have been projec¬ 
ted, in which the great reliance has been put 


123 


upon artificial aeration, either by forcing 
air into the sewage or by causing the 
latter to fall through the air in drops or 
streamlets. This has been accompanied 
by rapid filtration, generally through 
sand. Now aeration of the sewage, or of 
the filtering material, may be employed as 
an aid to sewage purification, but like all 
things else it has its limits. It can main¬ 
tain a supply of oxygen which is of use up 
to a certain point and this will be of value. 
All in excess of this amount is of no 
value, and even this is not of use 
unless time is given for the action of the 
oxygen and of the nitrifying organism. 
The latter develops rapidly in the presence 
of oxygen and organic matter, transform¬ 
ing the latter into mineral compounds. 
These facts are overlooked by some of the 
promoters of aerating processes,the assump¬ 
tion seeming to be that given a plenty of 
air the desired work will be accomplished 
almost instantly. The facts are that sew¬ 
age soon loses all the available oxygen 
taken up by it during aeration and needs 
to be aerated again and again until all 


124 


the organic matter is transformed. The 
time-element can best be secured, almost 
invariably in some form of filter bed. 

Perhaps there is an even greater 
misunderstanding regarding so-called 
electrical methods of sewage purifi¬ 
cation. These processes, which have 
met with but little favor, simply pre¬ 
pare by electrical means some chemical 
agent which performs all the work accom¬ 
plished and might be obtained in some 
other manner, although possibly at greater 
expense. In the Woolf and Hermite pro¬ 
cesses either sea water or a solution of 
common salt, according to the readiness of 
obtaining one or- the other, is partially de¬ 
composed by an electric current, and sodium 
hypochlorite is formed. The solution is 
mixed with the sewage and acts as a deo¬ 
dorizer and germicide, its efficiency de¬ 
pending on its strength. The organic 
matter remains in the sewage and is sub¬ 
ject to secondary decomposition later on. 
The product obtained by this process 
might be of value under certain conditions, 


125 


the same as other good disinfectants are, 
but there seems to be no reliable inform¬ 
ation to show that anything further 
can be expected of it. 

The direct treatment of sewage by elec¬ 
tricity has been talked of for some time 
but it still remains a dream. 


Broad Irrigation or Sewage Farming. 

Where sewage is applied to the surface 
of the ground upon which crops are raised 
the process is called broad irrigation, or 
sewage farming. The practice is in most 
respects similar to the ordinary irrigation 
of crops with clean water, the sewage be¬ 
ing applied by a variety of methods, ac¬ 
cording to topographical and other natural 
conditions and the kind of crops under 
cultivation. 

The land employed for this method of 
purification should preferably be composed 
of a fairly light, porous soil. The crops 
should be such as require, or at least 
develop best under a large amount of 


126 


moisture. Where the soil is heavy and 
wet, and the crops cannot stand much 
water, the sewage must be applied spar¬ 
ingly, and so a large amount of land 
and much labor must be provided. As 
broad irrigation areas may be prepared at 
comparatively small expense it is some¬ 
times feasible to make use of land not so 
well suited to the purpose as might be 
desired, provided it can be obtained 
cheaply enough and too much stress is 
not laid upon the raising of crops. The 
less the attention paid to cropping, gene¬ 
rally speaking, the greater the amount of 
sewage which can be put on a given area 
of land. Wet, clayey soils can take but 
little sewage^ under any circumstances, 
but sometimes improve with cultivation 
and the application of sewage. 

The application of an average of from 
5,000 to 10,000 gallons of sewage per day 
to one acre of land is considered by many 
as a liberal allowance. On the basis 
of 100 gallons of sewage per head of 
population this means that one acre of 


12 7 


land is sufficient for a population of from 
50 to 100 persons. More could be purified 
if the crops would stand it, but for each 
kind there is a limit which if passed 
means the destruction of the crop. 

Allowing even 10,000 gallons of sewage, 
or 100 persons, to an acre in a city of 20,000 
inhabitants would require 200 acres. To 
find suitable land at a low price near 
cities is not always easy. The larger the 
city the greater the difficulty. Labor, too, 
is a big item in sewage farming on this 
side the Atlantic, especially near cities. 
As a partial offset to this, great cities 
afford excellent and never-failing markets. 
Another great obstacle to adequate finan¬ 
cial returns from sewage farming in 
America is the deplorable fact that 
political ends and not business principles 
govern in large numbers of our cities, 
though there is good reason to predict 
a great change in this respect ere 
long. Where such conditions do prevail, 
however, the positions of both superin¬ 
tendents and laborers on sewage farms are 
almost sure to be considered rewards for 


128 


and encouragements to party service, with 
results most unfavorable to the enterprise 
in hand. Sewage farming means the sell¬ 
ing as well as the raising of crops, and 
perhaps of live stock, and so requires 
business ability and agricultural skill. 
The latter must be accompanied with the 
faculty of handling considerable bodies of 
men. 

These apparently discouraging state¬ 
ments are meant rather as warnings. They 
are necessary because of the glowing repre¬ 
sentations which have been made regard¬ 
ing the profits of sewage farming by those 
who have not looked at all sides of the 
question. I am not unmindful of the re¬ 
sults of sewage farming abroad, but Euro¬ 
pean conditions are far different from ours. 
Many of the European farms are most ad¬ 
mirably managed, both from an agricul¬ 
tural and business standpoint, and not a 
few of them have to contend with soil 
far less favorable than could be found 
in many sections of the United States. 
I do not say that an American city could 
not conduct so great an enterprise in a 


129 


creditable manner, for we have many 
well-conceived and well-operated munici¬ 
pal works of great magnitude. I do say 
that high prices for land near large cities, 
costly labor, a constant warfare against 
corruption with too frequent surrenders, 
and our sudden and complete changes in 
government all make sewage farming more 
difficult here than abroad. 

For the present, sewage disposal cannot 
be accomplished in this country at a profit. 
It is sometimes possible to regain through 
the raising of crops a part of the expense 
entailed in removing and purifying sewage, 
and this is the only method by which any 
considerable portion of the expense has yet 
been recovered here or elsewhere. We 
should be thankful for the day of small 
things, and wherever a revenue can be ob¬ 
tained from irrigation area or filtration 
beds our efforts should be to secure it. But 
the logic of figures will often show that 
some method of disposal that carries with 
it no financial returns is the cheapest, in 
which case instead of crying over spilt and 
wasted sewage, we may laugh over a sav- 


130 


ing in capital, interest and maintenance. 

Wherever irrigation, pure and simple, 
that is the application of water to crops 
for the sake of moisture, can be practiced 
to advantage, sewage farming should re¬ 
ceive serious consideration, for in such 
localities every drop of water is valua¬ 
ble. As ordinary irrigation may yet be 
used in the East as well as in the West, 
(it is already practiced to some extent in 
the South) the use of sewage for mere 
watering as well as fertilizing may some 
day be seen here and there throughout the 
length and breadth of the land. This is a 
subject which demands careful investiga¬ 
tion and perhaps might be taken up with 
advantage by some of our agricultural ex¬ 
periment stations and by any live official 
in a position to do so.* 


* For an article on “ The Use of Sewage for Irrigation in 
the Vest ” see Engineering Newts for .Nov. 3, 1892 ; the sub¬ 
stance of the article is aiso given in Kafter and Baker’s 
“ Sewage Disposal in the United States.’’ A later treatment 
of the subject may be found in “Sewage Irrigation,” Nos. 
3 and 22 of Water Supply and Irrigation Papers of the U. S. 
Geological Survey, by Geo. W. Bafter, M. Am. Soc. C. E. 
In March, 1905, the author of this book visited the sewage 
farm of Pasadena, Cal., and also land to which some of the 
sewage of Los Angeles is applied. As a result, he is more 
than even convinced of the wisdom of using sewage for ir¬ 
rigation wherever water is scarce. 



131 


Sub-Surface Irrigation. 

Before passing on to intermittent fil¬ 
tration a word should be said regarding 
sub-surface irrigation. The system is cap¬ 
able of use on a small scale, chiefly for 
private dwellings, various public institu¬ 
tions and small communities where for any 
reason surface disposal would be objection¬ 
able. The sewage is distributed through 
agricultural drain tiles, laid with open 
joints, and placed only a few inches below 
the surface. Provision should be made 
for changing the disposal area as often as 
the soil may require by turning the sewage 
into sub-divisions of the distributing pipes. 
The sewage is generally discharged auto¬ 
matically at intervals on the filling of a 
tank to a certain height. Where surface 
application can be practiced it would gen¬ 
erally, if not always, be preferable to this 
system. 


Intermittent Filtration. 

This method of sewage purification is 
capable of producing the highest results 


132 


under favorable conditions, and those con¬ 
ditions prevail perhaps more widely in this 
country than like ones for any other sys¬ 
tem. 

The process is a most simple one. 
With a competent man in charge large 
areas of beds can be operated with cheap 
labor. The construction of the beds is 
nearly as simple as their operation, only 
common labor being required, except for 
putting down pipe and accessories. 

The essential features of filter beds are 
some 4 to 5 feet "of medium-sized sand, 
located above the natural ground water 
level; a pipe system for distributing the 
sewage to one or more points on each bed, 
and another beneath the bed, for collecting 
the purified liquid. In operation, the sew¬ 
age is turned on to one bed for a given 
length of time, and then to another, in 
order to give the first a rest, or literally a 
breathing spell. When the beds become 
clogged with the matter retained on their 
surface and in their uppermost part, they 
may be raked over, or the sludge, and with 
it a thin layer of sand, may be scraped off. 


133 


If the beds are scraped, it will eventually 
be necessary to make good the sand re¬ 
moved, although this will not be required 
until perhaps a foot has been taken off, 
which should not result for a long time. 

Intermittent filtration is a nitrifying 
process effected through the agency of ox¬ 
ygen and bacteria, and requiring time for 
these two factors to act. A more complete 
definition is perhaps that given in the 
Report of the Massachusetts State Board 
of Health for 1893, as follows: 

The process * * * consists of intermingling 
the sewage in the pores of the filtering material, 
with sufficient air for a sufficient time, in the pres¬ 
ence of micro-organisms which quickly establish 
themselves there. 

Experience has taught that a good filter¬ 
ing material is one composed of clean, 
sharp sand with grains of uniform size, 
and having interstices forming about one- 
third the total volume. The interstices 
serve as air spaces. When the sewage is 
admitted to the sand not all the air is 
driven out, and hence there is a store of 
oxygen to be drawn upon by the bacteria. 


134 


As more and more sewage is added the 
oxygen is exhausted, the nitrifying bac¬ 
teria diminish in numbers, as they cannot 
live without air, and the efficiency of the 
purification process diminishes. If the ap¬ 
plication of sewage ceases, the beds grad¬ 
ually become drained as the sewage goes 
down, air is drawn into the pores of the 
bed, until finally a new supply is secured 
and the operation can be repeated. The 
sewage in filter beds spreads itself in thin 
films over the sand grains, thus giving 
bacteria an opportunity to develop, feed 
upon the organic matter, and so break it 
up as to cause the formation of new com¬ 
pounds, until the organic matter is trans¬ 
formed into inorganic. 

If intermittent filtration were a mere 
straining process, then the finer the sand 
used the higher the degree of purification. 
As already pointed out, it is a nitrifying 
rather than a straining process, so the aim 
must be to select a material of the size best 
suited to that end, and which will at the 
same time give the highest rate of filtra¬ 
tion with the least expenditure of labor. 


135 


The finer materials give a low rate of fil¬ 
tration and a high degree of purity. The 
sewage not only enters the sand slowly, 
but a long time is required to drain it out 
and renew the air. If crowded, poor re¬ 
sults and ultimate clogging follow. With 
coarse material the sewage passes through 
too rapidly for nitrification to take place. 
The drainage and air renewal can therefore 
be effected quickly. It is thus evident that 
with very fine material the sewage must 
be applied slowly, with long intervals of 
rest, while with very coarse material the 
rate of application must be yet slower and 
the rests far more frequent, though short. 
As compared with material of a medium 
size, the fine does not give sufficiently bet¬ 
ter results, in actual practice, to warrant 
its adoption, nor does the higher rate pos¬ 
sible with the coarse material. The slow 
rate of filtration and the tendency to clog, 
on the one hand, and the very frequent 
manipulation of gates to throw the beds 
into and out of use, on the other, are 
against the extremes. Moreover, the very 
coarse materials are not so certain in their 


136 


removal of bacteria as fine ones. Here, as 
elsewhere, a happy mean is to be sought. 
Rejecting the extremes, the Massachusetts 
State Board of Health, in its report for 
1891, gives as the range of available ma¬ 
terial sand having 10 percent, of its weight 
composed of grains finer than 0.03 to 0.98 
millimeters (0.0012 to 0.0392 ins.). 

All material in filter sands finer than 
0.01 mm. (0.0004 ins.) is classed as organic 
matter. The maximum size of the coarser 
materials included in the above range was 
about 0.5 in. in diameter, and the mini¬ 
mum size of the finest material was 0.01 in. 
in diameter. 

As the work done by a filter is largely 
determined by smaller particles of sand, 
and as a sand of uniform size is desired, the 
Massachusetts State Board of Health has 
adopted two standards for comparing dif¬ 
ferent materials. The sand is subjected to 
mechanical analysis to determine the per¬ 
centages, by weight, of the total which 
have grains below a certain diameter. The 
diameter at the 10 per cent, point is taken 
as the effective size, and the uniformity 


137 


coefficient is the ratio between the diameter 
of the grains at the 60 and 10 per cent, 
points. 

Although a range in the size of the sand 
grains may be allowed, the coarse and 
finer particles should be fairly well inter¬ 
mingled. Or, in other words, there should 
not be strata of fine and coarse material in 
a filter bed. The effect of stratification is 
well expressed in the report of the Massa¬ 
chusetts State Board of Health for 1892, 
as follows: 

We have thus found that with a coarse material 
above a fine one in the same filter there is a chance 
of trouble from a clogging of the fine material be¬ 
low the coarse; and this is far worse than surface 
clogging, for the latter can be completely remedied 
by disturbing the surface or by scraping. Y/e have, 
also found that a fine sand supported by a coarse 
sand will keep its lower layer saturated and act as a 
water seal, allowing the passage of water, but not 
of air, and may in this way prevent the necessary 
circulation of air, and reduce the action of the filter 
to mere straining. 

*******- * 

The above examples are perhaps extreme cases. 
With less marked differences in sand sizes, or with 
gradual instead of abrupt transitions from coarse 


138 


to fine, the causes of failure might be reduced, or 
even in some cases entirely eliminated. In the 
many cases where the fields available for sewage 
filtration contain layers of various materials, the 
different sands must be separately studied, in order 
to determine the probable action of existing com¬ 
binations ; and in case the natural conditions are 
unfavorable, changes may be made which will im¬ 
prove the action of the filter. 

Not all communities are so fortunate as 
to have ideal filtering material conven¬ 
iently located for sand filter beds. If not, 
then the choice may be between extending 
the outfall sewer to a distance, with or 
without pumping, and the adoption of a 
site giving poor material and thus requir¬ 
ing a larger area, or an inferior sand may 
be the only kind available far or near. 
The Lawrence experiments, to which ref¬ 
erence has freely been made, have now 
been carried on for about seventeen years, 
and the results of fifteen years’ studies of 
a great variety of material under widely 
different conditions are on record in the 
published reports of the Massachusetts 
State Board of Health. Actual results ob¬ 
tained at city filter beds are also available, 


139 


so that with expert advice any community 
may ascertain the approximate possibilities 
of such materials as are at hand. While 
a wide range of sands and gravels may be 
counted on for giving good results, under 
proper conditions, it is necessary to deter¬ 
mine those conditions in order to know 
what area of beds to provide, and how to 
apply the sewage after the disposal grounds 
are ready. The area and volume of sand 
or gravel required for the intermittent 
filtration of sewage are so large that the 
transportation of material any great dis¬ 
tance is out of the question. Generally 
speaking, the beds are constructed in ma¬ 
terial as naturally deposited, top soil and 
loam of course being removed, together 
with any pockets of other unsuitable ma¬ 
terial. 

The sewage is carried to the several beds 
through open or closed channels built in 
the embankments, with distributing cham¬ 
bers where two or more beds join together. 
Ordinary sewer pipe, half pipe, brick, con¬ 
crete or even wood conduits may be used. 
The distributing chambers may be of any 


140 


of the above materials, excepting sewer 
pipe, but are generally of masonry. Wood 
carriers or accessories are to be avoided, if 
possible, on account of becoming sewage- 
soaked, and thus liable to give off bad 
odors. 

The sewage should be brought onto the 
beds so as to disturb their surface as little 
as possible, and great pains should be taken 
to distribute it evenly over the whole bed. 

The underdrains should rarely, if ever, 
be placed more than 50 feet apart, and 
should be provided with manholes, or 
inspection chambers at all intersections. 
Underdrains are sometimes put much 
nearer together than this. Their size and 
depth will be governed by the amount of 
effluent they are expected to remove, the 
ground water level and possibly other local 
conditions. 

Before admitting sewage to the beds it 
is generally advisable to screen it, at least 
sufficiently to take out paper, rags and 
large floating matter. The screening cham¬ 
bers often serve to some extent as settling 
tanks, but must be of pretty large size to 


141 


remove any considerable proportion of the 
total matters in suspension. 

Crops are sometimes raised on filter 
beds, which is equivalent to practicing 
broad irrigation in summer and filtration 
the remainder of the year. The beds gen- , 
erally being thoroughly underdrained, and 
the soil often more permeable than that of 
a broad irrigation area, larger doses of 
sewage may probably be applied to crops 
on filter beds than those growing on ordi¬ 
nary sewage farms. 

The size of each bed should be such as 
to permit an easy and equable distribution 
of sewage over it. Where the total filtra¬ 
tion area is small it must be divided so as 
to permit of intermittent operation; that 
is, if a bed is to be in use and. at rest for 
equal periods, then at least two beds would 
be necessary, and so on according to the 
relative periods of use and rest. Some 
additional area should also be provided 
for use while beds are being scraped or in 
case of an emergency. If a large area is 
laid out so that the size of the beds is lim- 


142 


ited only by convenience in use, then an 
acre may be a very acceptable size. 

As to degree of purification which may 
be expected, and the rate of filtration, it 
may be said, without going into details, 
that practically all of the organic matter 
may be removed from sewage by inter¬ 
mittent filtration at rates approximating 
100,000 gallons per acre per day, with the 
best material and all conditions favorable. 
With unfavorable conditions the rate may 
be as low as 30,000 gallons per acre per 
day or even less. 


Contact Beds. 

To make possible an increase in the low 
rates feasible with intermittent filtration 
under even the best conditions, and also to 
lessen the clogging of such beds (the two 
efforts being largely identical), the Massa¬ 
chusetts State Board of Health early began 
to experiment with various preliminary 
processes of sewage treatment, including 
rapid filtration of various sorts and sedi¬ 
mentation. A little later than these exper- 


143 


iments, and in some instances coincident 
with them, a number of men began exper¬ 
iments on their own account. These in¬ 
cluded the late Colonel George E. Waring 
in America, and Scott-Moncrieff, Dibdin 
and others in Great Britain. In the latter 
country intermittent filtration has almost 
always been supplemental to broad irriga¬ 
tion or sewage farming. The clayey na¬ 
ture of most of the available land and the 
density of population, made imperative 
some change in sewage treatment in Great 
Britain, and from about 1892 on gave rise 
to a multiplicity of new schemes. Except 
for details these schemes may be narrowed 
down to contact beds and percolating fil¬ 
ters, with the septic tank, which has been 
described already, available as preliminary 
to either of these, and also to broad irriga¬ 
tion and sewage farming. Although, as a 
rule, it is dangerous to credit these newer 
processes to a single man, the contact bed 
may be ascribed to W. J. Dibdin, for some 
years Chemist to the London County Coun¬ 
cil. The percolating filter, as described in 
subsequent pages, cannot be so readily 


144 


credited to a single individual, since the 
Massachusetts State Board of Health, Col¬ 
onel Waring, Scott Moncrieff and several 
others had a hand in its development. 
Both the contact bed and the percolating 
filter, in their working form and the extent 
of their use, are essentially British. It 
may also be stated here that the septic 
tank was combined with contact beds al¬ 
most if not quite from the beginning of 
the development of the former by Donald 
Cameron. 

The contact bed differs from the Ameri¬ 
can type of intermittent filter in being 
composed of much coarser material, gen¬ 
erally enclosed by water-tight walls and 
floor, the basin thus formed being pro¬ 
vided with inlet and outlet gates. It also 
differs from the intermittent filter in that 
when in use the outlet gates are closed, 
the bed filled quickly and held full for two 
hours or so, then emptied quickly and kept 
empty for two to four or five hours. The 
series of operations is called a cycle, and 
there are from two to four cycles in each 
24 hours. The filling and emptying gates 


145 


are frequently worked automatically by 
means of specially designed apparatus. 

Contact beds are built for operation 
singly, in pairs and in groups of three; 
the sewage in the last two cases passing 
through two or three beds in succession. 
When built in pairs a coarse and a fine 
bed are provided. The coarse material is 
approximately from 3-4 to 2 ins. in great¬ 
est diameter, and the fine material from 
1-4 to 1 in. The material now most com¬ 
monly used in contact beds abroad is hard 
clinker from soft coal or from refuse de¬ 
structors, but coke, broken stone, gravel 
and other substances may be employed. 
Care should be taken to select a material 
which does not readily disintegrate. The 
coarse beds are sometimes called primary, 
and the fine ones secondary, and sometimes 
the terms single and double contact beds 
are used. 

The relatively large size of the material 
composing these beds, and of the intersti¬ 
tial spaces, permits quick filling and emp¬ 
tying, and facilitates also a rapid renewal 
of the air supply in the free spaces or pores 


146 


of the bed. The latter, in turn, favors an 
enormous bacterial development and a cor¬ 
respondingly speedy breaking down and 
transformation of the organic matter of 
the sewage. As can be understood, hold¬ 
ing the sewage in the bed in contact with 
the bacterial agents gives the beds their 
name. 

Some form of preliminary treatment, 
most commonly septic or sedimentation 
tanks, has been found advisable before 
applying sewage to contact beds, particu¬ 
larly where only a single contact is pro¬ 
vided. A high degree of bacterial removal 
is not commonly effected by contact beds, 
unless very fine material is employed, but 
the organic matter in the sewage may nev¬ 
ertheless be so transformed as to prevent 
nuisance from subsequent putrefaction, 
which is usually the main object of sewage 
treatment. With such an object it is re¬ 
ported that satisfactory results have been 
obtained when passing settled or septic 
sewage through double contact beds at 
rates of from 500,000 to 1,000,000 gallons 
an acre of total surface area. 


147 


Percolating Filters. 

Trickling, streaming and intermittent 
continuous filters are some of the names 
that have been applied to the last class of 
filters awaiting consideration, but both 
reason and usage are on the side of the 
term percolating filters. 

The essential features of percolating 
filters are the use of large-sized material, 
with the freest possible aeration and drain¬ 
age, and a uniform distribution of the 
sewage over the filter in drops, small 
streams or spray. The sewage has an un¬ 
interrupted passage through the drainage 
system of percolating filters, just as through 
intermittent filters, but the sewage is ap¬ 
plied continuously, or with numerous brief 
interruptions that break the continuity but 
a little, in the case of percolating filters, 
and the distribution is so even and rapid, 
and the pores of the filters are so large, 
that no sewage stands on the percolating 
filters, whereas the surface of intermittent 
filters is often flooded hours at a time. 

Percolating filters are generally built on 


148 


a solid floor of concrete or other water¬ 
tight material, and enclosed by open- 
jointed walls, the latter consisting of large 
fragments of the medium, laid up with 
open joints, or regular sized moulded or 
cut pieces, laid pigeon-hole fashion. Tne 
body of percolating filters is composed of 
clinker, stone or other fairly cohesive ma¬ 
terial, in particles from the size of a hen’s 
egg or a man’s fist up to that of a man’s 
head, the larger pieces being placed at the 
bottom. 

Distributors for percolating filters may 
be revolving radial arms of wrought-iron 
pipe, perforated, or revolving radial weirs, 
or fixed pipes provided with mere perfora¬ 
tions or with spray nozzles. Drains, formed 
in the concrete or other solid floor, or con¬ 
sisting of specially moulded tiles, are used 
to ensure thorough drainage. 

The effluent from percolating filters, 
even when the original sewage is given a 
preliminary treatment, is usually high in 
finely divided suspended matter, and also 
in bacteria, but, as a rule, the effluent is 
non-putrefactive and, being largely min- 


149 


eral matter, is easily removed or reduced 
in quantity by a brief period of sedimen¬ 
tation. The rates claimed for percolating 
filters, dosed with septic sewage, range 
from 1,000,000 to 10,000,000 gallons an 
acre, but in the present state of the art 
2,000,000 to 3,000,000 gallons seems high. 

Sewage Purification Plants Not 

N UISANCES. 

There is often much opposition to sew¬ 
age purification plants by those living or 
owning property near by on the ground 
that such works must of necessity be a 
nuisance. From experience gained by 
visiting many such plants, both in this 
country and abroad, and from studying 
the subject in other ways for years, I know 
that well conducted plants are entirely in¬ 
offensive, either within or without their 
enclosures. The employees about such 
works are as healthy as similar classes 
of men in other occupations, and 
the same holds true of the families of these 
men living on the-European sewage farms. 


150 


The crops raised on sewage farms are as 
safe eating as those of the same kind rais¬ 
ed elsewhere. There are objections, how¬ 
ever, to applying sewage to crops for hu¬ 
man consumption which are to be eaten 
without being cooked, but meat and milk 
from sewage farms is usually as good as 
when produced under other conditions. 

Good design and construction, followed 
by proper methods of operation, are all 
that are needed to make sewage purifica¬ 
tion a success, when once the right system 
has been adopted and put into use. No 
one system can be said to be the best for 
all localities. The special problems of 
each community must be met and solved 
case by case and out of several systems 
and combinations of systems the best for 
the conditions at hand must be chosen. 

The Peesent Status o.f Sewage 
Pueification. 

In the United States, chemical precipita¬ 
tion is no longer being adopted for new 
plants. The septic tank has come more 
rapidly into favor than contact beds or 


151 


percolating filters, but some men of prac¬ 
tical experience seem strongly inclined to 
plain sedimentation rather than the septic 
tank. Comparatively few percolating fil¬ 
ters have been built, but small contact 
beds are in use in a number of cases. In- ^ 
termittent filtration has for years been the 
system most in use in America, and seems 
likely to continue to lead where sandy land 
for filter beds is available at a reasonable 
price. In our Far West, sewage irrigation 
is frequently practiced, but as a rule the 
sewage is merely a substitute for water in 
sections where irrigation is a necessity. 
What appears to be the most successful 
sewage farm in the United States treats 
the sewage of Pasadena, Cal. Large and 
paying crops of walnuts are raised each 
year. On a visit to the Pasadena sewage 
farm in March, 1905, the author was told 
that a large number of orange trees would 
be set out soon, and that sewage would be 
put on these in the summer and on the 
walnut trees in the winter. 

Early in 1904 the author visited twenty- 
four sewage works in Great Britain and 


152 


three on the continent of- Europe. He 
found numerous chemical precipitation 
plants and sewage farms still in use, at 
the works visited and elsewhere, but many 
of these were being converted to, or sup¬ 
plemented by, the newer processes. The 
septic tank was widely used. Contact beds 
were numerous and percolating filters were 
fast becoming so. 

In America the septic tank, contact beds 
and percolating filters are far less often 
used, compared with other processes, than 
in Great Britain. Local conditions abroad, 
it should be remembered, are widely dif¬ 
ferent from local conditions here. The 
streams of Great Britain are small and the 
population dense, requiring more sewage 
works than are yet felt to be necessary in 
the United States, and the clayey soil and 
absence of good natural filtering ma¬ 
terial in England and Scotland compels 
the adoption of clinker, coke and other 
substitutes. All these things should be 
remembered in selecting a mode of treat¬ 
ment and filter bed material for American 
sewage works. 


153 


If it seem to any that the newer pro¬ 
cesses of sewage treatment have been but 
briefly discussed, the author would point 
out the fact that in 1904 there was pub¬ 
lished a whole volume in this series, enti¬ 
tled, “ The Treatment of Septic Sewage,” 
by George W. Rafter, M. Am. Soc. C. E. 
Later in 1904, the author of the book now 
being brought to a close, embodied his re¬ 
cent observations in Great Britain and at 
Paris, Frankfort and Wiesbaden, in “ Brit¬ 
ish Sewage Works.” Present day sewage 
treatment, from the viewpoint of British 
authorities, is set forth in Barwise’s “ The 
Purification of Sewage,” Rideal’s “ Sewage 
and the Bacterial Purification of Sewage,” 
and Dibdin’s “ The Purification of Sewage 
and Water.” The first American book on 
sewage was Rafter and Baker’s “ Sewage 
Disposal in the United States,” a large 
treatise on the subject published early in 
1894, before the septic tank, contact beds 
and percolating filters had come into pub¬ 
lic view. A revision of this treatise is 
under consideration. 
























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NO. 70.— MODERN REPRODUCTIVE GRAPHIC PRO¬ 
CESSES. By Lieut. James So Pettit, U.S.A. 

No. 77.— STADIA SURVEYING. The Theory of Stadia 
Measurements. By Arthur Winslow. 


No. 78.— THE STEAM-ENGINE INDICATOR, AND ITS 
USE. By W. B. Le Van. 


No. 79.—THE FIGURE OF THE EARTH. By Frank CL 
Roberts, C.E. 

No. 80.—HEALTHY FOUNDATIONS FOR HOUSES. Ry 
Glenn Brown. 





THE VAN NOSTRAND SCIENCE SERIES. 


No. 81.—WATER METERS: COMPARATIVE TESTS OF 
ACCURACY, DELIVERY, ETC. Distinctive 
features of the Worthington, Kennedy, Siemens, 
and Hesse meters. By Ross E. Browne. 

No. 82—THE PRESERVATION OF TIMBER BY THE USE 
OF ANTISEPTICS. By Samuel Bagster Boul¬ 
ton, C. E. 

No. 83.-MECHANICAL INTEGRATORS. By Prof. Henry 
S. H. SHAW, C. E. 

No. 84.-FLOW OF WATER IN OPEN CHANNELS, PIPES, 
CONDUITS, SEWERS, ETC. With Tables. By 
P. J. Flynn, C. E. 

No. 85.—THE LUMINIFEROUS AETHER. By Prof, de 
Volson Wood. 

No. 86.-HAND-BOOK OF MINERALOGY: DETERMINA¬ 
TION AND DESCRIPTION OF MINERALS 
FOUND IN THE UNITED STATES. By Prof. 
J. C. Foye. Fourth edition, revised. 

No. 87.-TREATISE ON THE THEORY OF THE CON¬ 
STRUCTION OF HELICOID AL OBLIQUE 
ARCHES. By John L. Culley, C. E. 

No. 88.—BEAMS AND GIRDERS. Practical Formulas for 
their Resistance. By P. H. Philbrick. 

No. 89.-MODERN GUN COTTON: ITS MANUFACTURE, 
PROPERTIES, AND ANALYSIS. By Lieut. 
John P. Wisser, U. S. A. 

No. 90.—ROTARY MOTION AS APPLIED TO THE GYRO¬ 
SCOPE. By Gen. J. G. Barnard. 

No. 91.— LEVELING' BAROMETRIC TRIGONOMETRIC 
AND SPIRIT. By Prof. I. O. Baker. 

No. 92.—PETROLEUM: ITS PRODUCTION AND USE. By 
Boverton Redwood, F. I. C., F. C. S. 

No. 93.-RECENT PRACTICE IN THE SANITARY DRAINAGE 
OF BUILDINGS. With Memoranda on the Cost of 
Plumbing Work. Second edition, revised. By 
William Paul Gerhard, C. E. 

No. 94.-THE TREATMENT OF SEWAGE. By Dr. C. Mey- 
mott T dy. 

No. 95.—PLATE GIRDER CONSTRUCTION. By Isami Hiroi, 
C. E. 2d edition, revised and enlarged. 

No. 96.—ALTERNATE CURRENT MACHINERY. By Gis- 
bert Kapp, Assoc. M. Inst., C. E. 

No. 97.— THE DISPOSAL OF HOUSEHOLD WASTES. By 
W. Paul Gerhard, Sanitary Engineer. 

No. 98.—PRACTICAL DYNAMO BUILDING FOR AMATEURS. 

HOW TO WIND FOR ANY OUTPUT. By Frederick 
Walker. Fully illustrated. 

No. 99—TRIPLE - EXPANSION ENGINES AND ENGINE 
TRIALS. By Prof. Osborne Reynolds. Edited, 
with notes, etc., by F. E. Idell, M. E. 





THE VAN NOSTRAND SCIENCE SERIES. 


No. 100.—HOW TO BECOME AN ENGINEER, or the Theo¬ 
retical and Practical Training necessary in fittins 
for the duties of the Civil Engineer. By ProfT 
Geo. W. Plympton. 

No. 101.—THE SEXTANT, and other Reflecting Mathemati¬ 
cal Instruments. With Practical Hints for their 
adjustment and use. By F. R. Brainard, U. 8. 
Navy. 

No. 102.—THE GALVANIC CIRCUIT INVESTIGATED 
MATHEMATICALLY. By Dr. G. S. Ohm, Ber¬ 
lin, 1827. Translated by William Francis. With 
Preface and Notes by the Editor, Thomas D. 
Lockwood, M.I.E.E. 

No. 103.—THE MICROSCOPICAL EXAMINATION OF 
POTABLE WATER. With Diagrams. By Geo. 
W. Rafter. 

No. 104.—VAN NOSTRAND’S STABLE BOOK FOR CIVIL 
AND MECHANICAL ENGINEERS. Compiled 
by Prof. Geo. W. Plympton. 

No. 105.—DETERMINANTS. An Introduction to the Study 
of, with Examples and Applications. By Prof. 
G. A. Miller. * 

No. 106.—COMPRESSED AIR. Experiments upon the 
Transmission of Power by Compressed Air in 
Paris. (Popp’s System.) By Prof. A. B. W. 
Kennedy. The Transmission and Distribution of 
Power from Central Stations by Compressed Air. 
By Prof. W. C. Unwin. 

No. 107.—A GRAPHICAL METHOD FOR SWING-BRIDGES. 

A Rational and Easy Graphical Analysis of the 
Stresses in Ordinary Swing-Bridges. With an 
Introduction on the General Theory of Graphical 
Statics. By Benjamin F. La Rue. 4 Plates. 

No. 108.—SLIDE VALVE DIAGRAMS. A French Method 
for Constructing Slide Valve Diagrams. By Lloyd 
Bankson, B.S., Assistant Naval Constructor, U. 
S. Navy. 8 Folding Plates. 

No. 109.—THE MEASUREMENT OF ELECTRIC CUR¬ 
RENTS. Electrical Measuring Instruments. By 
James Swinburne. Meters for Electrical Energy. 
By C. H. Wordingham. Edited, with Preface, 
by T. Commerford Martin. Folding Plate and 
numerous illustrations. 

No. 110.—TRANSITION CURVES. A Field-Book for Engin¬ 
eers, containing Rules and Tables for Laying 
out Transition Curves. By Walter G. Fox, C.E. 

No. 111.—GAS-LIGHTING AND GAS-FITTING. Specifica¬ 
tions and Rules for Gas-Piping. Notes on the 
advantages of Gas for Cooking and Heating, and 
Useful Hints to Gas Consumers, Second edition, 
rewritten and enlarged. By Wm. Paul Gerhard, 
C. E. 

No. 112.—A PRIMER ON THE CALCULUS. By E. Sherman 
Gould, M. Am. Soc. C. E. 








JUM 21 





TEXT B< 


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